Fallen
by MaeveTheBrave
Summary: What do you do when everything has fallen apart? Stranded alone, the few fallen souls who are left try to survive the zombie apocalypse. AU
1. Alone

**Fallen ~**

What do you do when everything has fallen apart? Stranded alone, Natsuki has to wonder if there's anything worth fighting for anymore while trying to survive the zombie apocalypse. AU

Mmm. Zombies. It's come to my attention that this is a bit of a tried and worn topic to throw the MH characters into, but hopefully you will find my story tastefully different.

**Chapter One**

**Alone ~**

I used to be able to sleep. It was never something I had to think about in advance. There was never any danger in sleep. Now… I hardly sleep at all.

My eyes open on a snap and I have the urge to bolt upright. It's painful as my body aches, telling me I've been going too hard for too long. I know I need more sleep as my eyes still twinkle with sand and the grogginess makes me sag. But nonetheless, I scan the room out of habit, hurriedly whipping my head behind and around me. I'm relieved to find it's only me, although my hand has already instinctively gone to the gun holstered in my pants.

I see I'm in a dim bathroom. It's a full bathroom with ceramic tile, which I have just awoken from, a long cabinet sink, and a shower. I take a guess that this is an apartment or a hotel. There is debris scattered around the floor, all covered in a chalky tan dust. Vague memories of dark hallways, probably last night, float around my head, but I don't remember entering a bathroom, which should probably scare me more than it currently is. Did I get drunk again? I'm assured that I must have as the hangover starts to hit my stomach.

The room is dark. There are no windows and the power grid for Tokyo has long since fizzled out. These kinds of places, hotels and the like, used to be very unsafe. During the initial outbreak, the government kept people locked up in the hotels and even their own homes to try to prevent spreading of the disease. Instead, the virus was able to sneak its way into every one of those homes and hotels and carefully, surely turn everyone into monsters. But now, they're all mostly empty. Everyone has walked back out. It's the higher floors that are usually safest now.

I'm frustrated as I quickly try to wake my blurriness away. I'm a light sleeper now but I never want to wake up anymore. Though I understand all too well what would happen if I just let myself slide and relax. An internal battle that has me torn, give up or keep going.

In fact, I get so little sleep, I've lost track of time. I'm no longer on any schedule. The sun means nothing anymore. I'm only asleep or awake when I need to be.

I try to move only to find that my arm has fallen asleep because I had been lying on it. I sleepily roll over towards the nearest piece of furniture and sloppily use the counter to pull myself up, my feet stumbling for footing underneath me. I finally stand off the ceramic tile flooring, squinting. Sandy dust and small pieces of the ceiling run off my back.

My stomach groans as I stand up straight. It hurts, stretching, because I've not eaten anything recently but the scraps I manage to find. So I've learned to ignore the hunger pains.

There's a creak just outside the door and I become on edge. Instinctively, I reach for my weapon and hold it tensely. A distinct scratchy sigh follows the creaking, alongside a strained gurgle, as if the sound of choking. I hold my breath, my eyes widen and I let a heavy, exasperated exhale out through my nose.

It always startles me, knowing what they are, knowing that they're here; _near_ me. To live in this fear… it's torture. To always have your chest pounding, adrenaline pumping, jumping at every shadow, takes such a physical toll.

Praying in this filth left by civilization for deliverance; to be left alone. I feel a teardrop, but try to ignore it. It kills to always be running and also have to live on what little bits and pieces this ruined city has to offer. A body can't keep up. But the living alone, firstly the overwhelming fear that comes with the darkness, but also being separate from everything you once knew, except for the demented ghosts of what used to be people, that might just be the worst.

This is life now. Maybe I had something once. I may have had friends, a home, a future, a love… but now… I have nothing. My name is Kuga Natsuki, and for the past six months, I've been wandering the streets of a Tokyo I once knew, alone, waiting for the rescue they said would come.

Why shouldn't I just kill myself? I could do it now. I have the gun. I wouldn't have to put up with this shit any longer. No more pain. No more feeling. No more of this freakish insanity that has become the unfortunate reality. What the hell am I waiting for? Why am I still here? I'm broken and forgotten… I've lost it all. What am I still hanging onto?

It's hard to believe… that out of the world's billions of people… why me? It can't just be me...

I slowly lean against the door, sliding down to sit against it to barricade myself in, which is always a stupid move. It puts you right into checkmate. They don't even have to _try_ to trap you.

I can feel tears that simply overflow and cascade down my face, then drip tenderly off my chin as I sob silently. I bite my tongue, clench my teeth together, and feel all my muscles stiffen as the stress bares down on me. I must be silent. Or they will hear me. I can feel just below my jaw, along the ridge of my throat, how it tenses in a severe grip, as I have to agonizingly hold it all back. To keep just barely from breaking down entirely. I'm not supposed to lose it. Not like this. Not on my own. I can't afford that.

I know there's a good number of them out there now. There's more consistent shuffling and scrapping outside now. Their footsteps, each leaden and exhausted and their breathing: every breath droning, discomforting and barren as wind itself. I can hear every detail. It's terrifying, to think now possibly more have been _drawn_ here. I am truly frozen with panic, so much so that I can do nothing but sit through it.

I heave my chest tightly to keep quiet, for I must stay quiet or else they may know exactly where I am. But I'm pretty sure they've already smelled me out and that is why there are so many out there.

I try in vain to stall each empty cry that wants to explode out of me, turning them into small coughs. I tap the nozzle of my gun mercilessly against my forehead in a final attempt to think and reason as I hold myself crunched over my knees against the door.

An incoherent curse or two slips every few moments. I can't bear to open my eyes to face this reality. I press my back harder against the door. In this trapped little bathroom, I allow myself to melt this much. Knowing what's outside, meaning just outside this door... they're so close. I don't think within the past half year I have ever been this trapped, hunted and close to them all at once.

_Wait… _I think slowly._ Bathroom._ I look up immediately. Why didn't I think of this earlier? In a frenzied crawl, I make it over to the first object. I stare at the toilet absently. I want to punch it for not having water in it.

'It's not fair!' I nearly scream. I pull out the tap of the sink next. Nothing comes out, dashing any of my desperate hopes. I lean against the sink, defeated, I put my head down on the counter. This thirst is incredible. This is not a life at all.

And I have to wonder, in my final efforts of survival, do my last resorts make me just as unhuman as them? If living like this, like an animal: killing and hunting, is no life at all, then is everyone truly gone? Have the very things inside of us that make us human truly departed?

A whirring sound faintly buzzing outside catches my attention. The buzzing is foreign, as in: not created by the sickies. It isn't breathing, nor is it footsteps. It's far away but it definitely sounds new and possibly man-made. At first, I think it's a generator kicking in somewhere. It excites me for a moment and I strain to hear whatever lay beyond the door and beyond the room, whist half-heartedly flickering the light switch, but nothing happens.

Actually, the longer I listen, the stronger the humming gets. I'm confused as I try to guess what it may be. An AC unit somewhere? Nothing that makes sense. But if it's getting closer, it could be important. I cannot stay in this bathroom forever. I'm split between going out to investigate the noise, an opportunity which may pass me by if I don't make an attempt, and staying here and safely waiting it out. Both sides have their pros and cons. There are cannibals outside and I don't know how many, so it could end badly. But going beyond my sanctuary could also be beneficial if it turns out to be other people out there. I touch on the sensitive subject of rescue and other survivors. It is such a long-shot it hurts, and I've generally dubbed this topic taboo in my head now for the false hope that it brings, but it provides so much optimism I cannot help it. And having listened to nothing but heavy breathing for such a long time now, this idea of more survivors sounds more promising than anything.

I click the safety of my handgun off. I decide on leaving. I decide that even though my new lifestyle is inhumane, life is still worth fighting for. The very thing that makes us human is inside of us, it is in our bodies, in our minds, and our courage, and cannot be taken away. And I still have those things.

With energized force, I kick the door open to a decrepit room with five even more decrepit-looking zombies wandering aimlessly in it. My loud clatter makes them all loosely turn their heads. My mouth gapes stupidly and I gawk like I've never seen anything like them. In abrupt times like these there is not much more one can do than be surprised.

But I learned early on in my survival career here, that having the right attitude and focus towards this craziness means everything. You_ need_ to stay in the right state of mind. If you hesitate or over-think or panic, you're screwed. Your best chances are when you take things head on. I'm not afraid.

I quickly shoot through this crowd and they fall. USing the gun is a bad idea in itself, but I plan on leaving soon. I only take five shots and waste no more. I make them clean to the head by getting up close to them, but staying agile and not letting their feeble bodies near me.

Thinking strategically, I walk to the next door, which happens to be to my right, and I'm ready to walk out and explore, but then I hear the buzzing behind me.

I turn around to what is an amazing view of the city. A large, tall window missing it's curtains and most of its glass occupies a majority of the opposite wall. A fantastic, expensive view glares at me in the morning daylight. I walk bewildered up to the edge. I realize I'm on a high floor so I get a panoramic view of what used to be a beautiful, modern city. It's overwhelming, but this is where I've been living for some time: in this hellhole. I can see high trails of smoke wafting from many buildings and ruined remains of everything everywhere. Things just keep burning. I'm too high up to see any figures, but I imagine that the streets are still crawling with people. In fact, I'm sure I've drawn some here now with my gunshots. I have the urge to start running. But my attention is hooked here.

I hear what I've been listening for. The buzzing sounds more periodically like a whip now, the sound quickly heightening and fading. It sounds like nothing I can place, and probably not a generator. I can hear it clearly now. Then something new appears in the far background, very tiny, sailing across the sky. I bend closer to the broken window, trying to find out what the thing is.

And before I can think, shooting upwards, right next to the building, a bulky black aircraft rockets by. I fall backwards in sudden alarm. I stare in awe as a black military helicopter zooms by. It rocks the air around it, blowing into the room like a hurricane. Its gigantic frame making it look impressive and elegant yet powerful close up. Its blades beating so fast they look slow, and creating the loudest whipping noise, almost deafening me because I'm so close. It makes my ears pop, in the same way as when you reach high altitudes, so I cover my ears, letting my gun clatter to the floor. I swear in that spilt second I could see the pilot.

After it passes in what maybe was two seconds, but felt longer, I rise and poke my head out the window, not minding the broken glass, to watch it continue away. It only strikes me after a few moments that those were _others_. Other people... and they may not have even seen me! No!

I lean further out and wave my arms like a desperate moron. No! That was my chance! How am I supposed to get my life back? How am I supposed to see my friends again?

But while I'm doing that, I don't notice the procession of more military choppers behind that one. It isn't until I've given up flagging down the first, now so far away, that I see more. It brightens my spirits monumentally. To see another chance when I think I've lost it completely.

On a whim, I try to wave harder and bigger than ever. What is it, thirty, forty of them? I scream, though I know that it's useless and potentially dangerous. I don't care. I can't care about anything else but rescue now. Maybe it selfish, but I need to get back! I feel my tears hit me again as the cloud of helicopters doesn't see me. I have to get back to her… even though I know she was bitten. I had seen her get bitten right before my eyes. And then we had gotten separated.

I'm overwhelmed by the sudden amount of aircraft. I nearly drop back to the floor. No… they don't see me. What am I supposed to do? What could I possibly do?

But in mid-thought, one of the military copters jumps. I have to blink to make sure I had seen it. It looked like it had dipped a little and the tail had swung slightly. It's too far away to tell completely, but it seemed obvious out of the uniform others. I watch it dumbly as it sways again.

The helicopter I stare at seems that it can now be classified as inexperienced because of what looks like amateur flying skills. It's not long before it's closer. Then that's when it starts to completely lose control. It looked like it was having trouble before, but now a small explosion rocks the shaft of the tail. My mouth hangs open as I am witness to more insane devastation. It spirals in downward circles with a new line of gasoline smoke puffing out of the back arm. In fact, it is close enough now that as it spirals past, I have to duck out of fear that the flaming tail will strike me. Part of it mashes against the building, which causes the floor to shake.

Looking quickly at the bubble of the cockpit, I can see a cold-blooded figure stirring around over the top of a pilot's helmet, who is laying face down on the controls. _No one is left unaffected._

I shove my head out the window to watch in gruesome horror as the machine makes it's final landing, a ball of fire with overlapping smoke swells upwards once it hits the ground. I have no idea-

Suddenly, the clawing at the door I hadn't noticed smashes the door open. Groping across the floor uncoordinatedly, walkers file in. They've heard me. They know I'm here. They are not to be taken lightly. If given an opportunity, they can be fast.

Hurriedly reaching for the pistol I had dropped, I lunge onto the floor onto my stomach, bravely closer to the them, mind you, and turn fast on my side to shoot. I manage to bring down one of the leads, nailing them in the head with practiced aim. The thick, disorientating bang of the gun fills my ears.

God, it sucks when they come out of nowhere. They're all so close. Lumbering quickly over to me, faster than I would like them to be moving. I am barricaded in. There is only one door in this room and these things are streaming right through it.

For a good moment I am paralyzed. What do I do? These are the things that go 'bump' in the night. These are the decaying phantoms of what once were people. These are the very creatures that lived under your bed when you were younger. And I have to stare at their faces.

I have to make a decision. Do I want to continue?

I don't have much time to take the deep breath I wanted to, so I gulp in the lungful I can and aim my firearm. It is a lot of gore to have to see all the time. A lot to be faced with, and this time, they are practically hovering over me.

I feel the kickback a second after tugging the trigger back, then a splatter of god-knows-what gushes over me. I frantically crawl backwards still on the floor. I back against the windowsill and keep shooting. Eventually I can pull myself up to a knees-bent standing position, hanging onto the side of the broken glass pane.

When I am able to drop a few more of them, I make my break for it. I push past one I left standing because I didn't want to use up all of my bullets. I form a fist and shove it's chest away from me. I don't have any sort of melee weapon to use so I have to touch it. It comes to my attention how damp it's shirt felt. It makes me shiver to think what I touched. I should wash my hands later if I ever find a decent supply of water.

So I have a new goal in mind as I head out of the room and into a tight hallway. Immediately there are more zombies staggering down the hall. It is too narrow for me to scoot past them. I am forced to fire and they fall. They fall without any flailing or self-protection. No arms being thrown in front of them to catch themselves. No, they fall brain-dead. With a distinct lifeless thud. I am quick to jump over them and move the fuck on.

The hallway is dark even though it is day. Most of the room's doors are shut, and there's no power for lights. The walls are painted a maroon red, and so the splatters of blood, new and old marks alike, blend in well.

This hotel has sharp turns and corridors which I do not like. You can never quite tell what will be around the next bend. I like the open spaces better. And you certainly cannot hear anything over the wicked thumping of your own heart and your feet on the floor.

I'm looking for a stairwell to get down. I try to make out what signs I can that have info about exits. I can feel my running is sloppy, and tired. My sneakers are worn and ripped and I slid a little on the wood when I bank a turn, but most of the fault goes to my poor fitness and anxiety.

I realize I am in one hell of a maze. And I do find a couple more individuals that just as lost as me. One case in particular is exactly what I was hoping not to happen: again I have to go around a corner, and as I do so, almost smack face first into one of them. I jump back. Spooked, I don't raise my gun right away. The thing groans and breathes heavily. It takes step towards me then it limps using its other foot.

"No…" I tell it, getting over the usual surprise. I kick it down to make less noise. This one is down very easily. It squirms on the floor and I take a second to watch it._ What has happened to humanity? Why...?_

From there, it's not long before I find an open elevator shaft. My mind swims with possibilities. I haven't found stairs yet. This could be an option. Dangerous and dark, but it could get me out of here quickly. The doors have been pried open and I have to squint to see inside the tunnel. Sure enough, there are the elevator cords hanging through the middle. I brace myself on the doorframe and lean into the cave. I try to see any obstacles, but it's too dark.

I whip my head behind and around me. No one. I estimate how much time I have left before they find me. Not much. I slip the gun back in my pants and start to untie my laces. I yank them out of my right shoe. Then I take a part of my jacket that has already been ripped and continue the tear.

I take the textile rectangle and string I have and wrap them loosely around my hand. Again, I glance around near me. At the end of the hall to my left, there are more.

"Shit." It's now or never. I need to do this. I make that leap of faith into the abyss. I am in the darkness before my hand can touch the steel cord and grab it for dear life. I hold onto it and wrap my legs around it. It shakes insecurely and floats unfettered. I need to climb down, into the void. But I find myself frozen. My hands are stuff. Once I'm attached to the line, I can't move.

But at the back of mind, I know I must. And survival creates motivation.

Using the fabric to prevent rope-burn and the string to weakly pace myself, I begin to slide down. I can see nothing now. And being in this blackness, I am unsure of my speed. I'm also nervous about where the elevator might be. If it's above me, is it possible that I'm shaking it lose of its brakes by hanging on this cable? I'm suddenly acutely unnerved about falling objects. What if one of the walkers chased me down here and walks right of the edge and into the shaft?

My muscles are tense with unfamiliar fear and blinding blackness. God, I wish I still had that flashlight…

I try to slow to a stop on the cable and start to climb down manually. I start doing that, putting one unseen arm below the other, still grabbing the rope between my shoes. I vaguely remember doing this somewhere. Maybe in a gym class once.

I have to keep going. What else could I do?

* * *

><p>Going outside is the worst. Most of the walkers are in very bad condition now, after these long six months. They are a pity to look at and it's unbelievable to watch some of them actually walk. They have just the right amount of 'revived' brain activity to keep their hydraulics working, making them walk. But only so fast and for so long. Therefore, most of them cannot climb up or down anything, so getting to somewhere high, is always a smart idea. That is, unless there are already some of them in that building.<p>

I'm running and take a uncoordinated leap through the hotel's broken front door. I stumble out onto the sidewalk. Morning light blinds my dilated pupils. I squint around me quickly.

In new areas, the most important thing is to establish safety. It's something all police forces, all military and SWAT teams were trained to do. Whether to keep someone in or something out, you must create a perimeter. Scouting these large areas for dead people is an obvious must-do. However something like adjusting to a new climate, something along the lines of being temporality sun-blinded, it's nearly impossible to see and be aware of your surroundings. The best thing to do here is to keep moving. Zig-zag sprinting works nicely.

I must look like an idiot, but I swear this is important. Even for those few seconds where you only see blur, the walkers can and will catch up to you. Quickly, I'm able to see color again and I survey my surroundings.

It would be a straight-up lie to say that I don't get scared here. Of course I do. Who the hell wouldn't? I don't like looking at their faces, I don't like hearing them, I don't like being alone. Do you have any idea how much it hurts to have the rest of the world be _dead_ around you? _Walking _around you. What pain it is? I take out this frustration on a daily basis. My knuckles are always bruised and I'm usually sore because of it. It'd be nicer to have a sole individual to be mad at, but it's just me. Always. Just. Me. However, I think I have purpose. I'm still here because my life was saved. For a reason. And I owe her. But what can I do for her now? It hurts me more than I want to think about. I've found it is easiest to not think about the last times I was with her. But if anything, I think she would want me to help the other survivors… if there are any.

This street looks as every other does. Bashed, beaten and burned cars scatter the roadway. Bent poles lean over as if they're dead too. Broken glass and small items dot the street randomly. Smoke still flows out of open windows. And papers float aimlessly in the breeze. There are a limited number of zeds hobbling around. Eyes open and unblinking. I decide not to spend too much time outside.

There is one particular place of interest in all this mess to me that I need to visit. I walk over cautiously. The black helicopter's exterior is still smoldering. The metal is twisted and melted as if it were a toy. I keep my distance.

I can't stop the thought that comes to mind though: communication. Inside the chopper. These are newly dispatched military type machines. They must have radios. I make these connections all too immediately. It's not a good idea for me to get anywhere near this thing. I could just continue my own search of supplies elsewhere. There's a whole metropolis to piece through.

But no. This helicopter is all too alluring. I inch closer to it. It crashed on the side of the hotel nobody cares about, inside a small fenced-in dumpster area. I try to get behind it to see if there's any entrance, but I can't go completely around it because of the tall fence.

Maybe if I climb up to the fuselage… No, I imagine this heat would burn me. But I screw it all as I glance behind me only to see a group of the undead trailing me. Another now or never situation.

I jump up to grab the landing skids. They're still hot, but I can hold onto it. Straightening my arms out, pushing myself up, I can swing my legs up. Directly in front of me is opening to the fried door. Again, that logical part of me is telling me to leave it alone. But I grab the latch, unthinking.

"Fuck!" It's scalding. Luckily I'm quick enough to slide the heavy door immediately open, using all my weight, before I give up and wave my hand. I'm burnt and my hand is red and stings. But if I want to get this done, I have to be even quicker now. I had slid the door with a loud bang.

Reaching inside, there are two dead bodies of the men who had been flying this contraption. I'd like to squeeze my eyes shut and pretend I'm home more than anything now. It's smells of burning rubber and flesh. An unpleasant smell to say the least.

I gather myself mentally, still only leaning into the cockpit, and find what I want. The radio is screwed into the dashboard and not something I can take with me, so I screw around with the buttons to try to get a signal. It buzzes at me angrily repeatedly as I can't get anything working and that's just about when I'm ready to call it quits on account of it being too badly broken. Then I hear a voice.

"…any …we're… suburb… here… others…" That's all I needed. I scramble to press the button down.

"Yes! Anybody! I'm another survivor! Is there anybody out there? My name is Kuga Natsuki, I'm in Shibuya, Tokyo. Can anyone hear this?! Hello?" I let go of the speaking button, remembering how I can't hear any messages while I am holding it. I wait. Static crackles for a moment. It tunes up and down. Maybe there is a message trying to get through, but I can't get it.

Suddenly, the radio sparks. On instinct I retract myself out of the helicopter. Scrambling backwards in the tiny space, I drop out of the haul and land on cement on my back. I mutter a much deserved, "Oww," from the over-a-meter-fall.

The sparks must've hit leaking gasoline, and I must be the luckiest person on earth because not two seconds later did the whole machine burst into more flames. This startles me, the zombies behind me startle me, and the lightning strike in the distance startles me.

A sharp pain hits my stomach then. I have to double over, with my lower back still aching. This is a new and sudden feeling. This hasn't happened before and it worries me. I still need to get the hell out of here. It's not like a feeling of sickness, nor an exterior wound, more of a stabbing interior pain. I cough weakly. Blood drizzles out of my mouth. I put a hand to my face and find oozing down my chin is blood. What is this… so suddenly…? Is it from the fall? Did I puncture something?

The dark clouds are now hovering over me as a sprinkle begins. It's cold enough, I would expect a snow soon. I totter to my feet without using my burnt hand or my other hand holding my mouth. All I can think of is shelter. I can see all the oncoming problems stagger closer to me.

'I can… still do this…' I think sluggishly.

As the rain starts, I know I've officially hit my lowest point.


	2. Others

**Fallen~**

Thank you guys for the reviews! It's fantastic to hear feedback! I'll try to keep the chapters coming this fast.

Re-edited this for a change of POV. Added some more details. OOC warning.

**Chapter Two**

**Others~**

I remember the day Fuuka evacuated. I remember exactly. That was the day I got separated from her...

The weather fit the occasion well. Rain.

I wait on the platform, against the hurrying crowd, for her.

Once we're together, everything becomes chaos because soldiers open fire on approaching deads. The people panic and we get ripped apart.

"Nao. Get up. You're on patrol." My words are absorbed by large, dark curtains around the sound, meant to be soundproof. I could see that Nao barely registers my words, much less the irritated tone I have attached to them. Settled happily into another, carefree world of her own, Nao won't even remember the order after five minutes.

I kick her futon, "Wake the hell up." Nao only rolls at the request. She might've murmured something back, but I didn't hear it. I note that Nao was again sleeping with her tongue partially sticking out. As I've learned to conclude: Nao was having a good dream, or, better than here in any case, and it's never a pleasant to wake her.

But I've had enough of Nao's laziness in front of me after I've has been up for hours already. Nao doing this day after day at first surprised me. I'm always on edge when I sleep. Who on earth could sleep peacefully in these times? With those things just outside the door…

Sighing at the useless teenager, I grab the side of the bare mattress and heave the damn thing up. Nao quickly starts to flail but she is dropped to the floor anyway, entangled in her sheets. Now completely awake, Nao stormily stands and being her normal aggravated self, shouts and shoves me after I let the futon fall down again,

"I hate you!" She screams like every morning. To relieve ourselves of the oncoming skirmish, I only hold out the semi-automatic handgun. Nao violently grabs the firearm and turns to the door,

"I hate all of this! I don't wana do this anymore!" She is smart enough not to slam the door as she walks out into the apartment building hallway. This only minimally caches my attention, as I stand still in the dark room. Nao has always been the one closest one to suicide. She is never able to stay on good terms with anyone in the group. She has no family left. And she is never motivated enough to do anything.

But she would never do such a thing. I know Nao has an invisible string that still ties her to the earth. That thin string of memories, willpower, and burnt compassion. I hear the barricades at the end of the floor being moved and replaced so Nao can get out to the stairwell.

Of course, everyone here has one of those ties. A small thing that pulls people down from radical thoughts. A small hope. Enough to stop people from taking themselves out of the picture (whatever picture it is that's left). I know mine… I'm not sure if it's good to believe in false hope, but that doesn't stop anything anymore.

Carefully touching a healed scar on her right shoulder and I wonder if she's still out there. I hope she's alive. I hope she got off that train platform and ran somewhere far away. Somewhere safe.

I miss you more than I can bear, but if nothing more, I wish for your safety, my Natsuki.

I don't know Nao's reason, why ever she's still her, I know something's still got a good grip on her throat. But I know better than to ask and trigger more hostility from the her, or prompt memories. I know how hard memories are to deal with in this time.

I can still feel the last second she grabbed me hand, reaching through the pulling crowd. The last time she called my name. Shouting to me, not to lose each other.

In a time when everything everyone once knew is gone.

But I can guess what that one big idea everyone holds onto now is. A sliver of optimism and expectation. It is hard to hold onto after such a long time. Six months ago, a rescue was said to come.

* * *

><p>Leaving Nao's room, I check briefly to make sure Nao has re-boarded the blockade. "Hey Shizuru," A voice catches up with me walking down the hallway. I turn.<br>"Chie." The girl must've just been relieved by Nao, "Nao's out there now?" I ask to double check.  
>"Yeah she's fine. But I wanted to show you the shopping list now." She grins.<br>"Okay." I'm hesitant, knowing Chie will drag this out forever, no matter how many times I tell her it's not a good idea.

"It's grown to twenty-one items now, from everyone." She pushes with her reasoning.  
>"I still don't-"<br>"Will you at least read some of them?" Chie pleads. Not that she actually needs a veto or anything from me, but apparently it would mean something to the girl to get an OK on the trip. "Please? I need some of them. I mean, we all need them. Come on! This is the simplified list too."  
>"Fine." I take the crumpled piece of paper from the eager hand to entertain her. I glance to both ends of the hallway, and stop then to read them off.<p>

"Boots, coats, hats, tissues, toilet paper, ammo, food, binoculars." I pause, "Do you really know where to find all of this stuff? What if we go into Tokyo and there's nothing left?"  
>"You don't know that."<br>"But one can assume the wreckage that's left." I proceed reading the list.

"Mittens, water bottles, bandages, antiseptics, electronics and batteries, tampons…" I smirk.  
>"It's legitimate!" Chie argues.<br>"Fine," I smile, "I'll think about it."

"Nao is up for it." I narrow my eyes.  
>"You asked her?"<br>"She has some contributions in here." I once again start to walk to the next apartment.

"We need these things soon Shizuru. It's getting colder."

"If not a group, then let me go alone." She presses.  
>"That's worse."<br>"I could travel faster alone. I know where I'm going. I know Tokyo better than most of you."  
>"Why don't we search Fuuka once more?"<br>"Shizuru, you know we've covered a lot of Fuuka and found not much of use."  
>"I'd rather it's a close-by area."<br>"We've exhausted our resources here."  
>I sigh, "And if I still say no, I'm guessing you will go on your own anyway now?"<br>Chie nods, interested where I'm going with this now, "I'm hungry. You're hungry. Nothing here can make that better."  
>"We'll talk about it later, okay?"<p>

Continuing down the blood-colored and blood-splattered hallway, we turn into the biggest room of the apartment building third floor. Most of these apartments were well-ruined by the time we got here. This one has the largest open area and we use it to keep everyone together. There are other apartments we've cleared out, like Nao's studio room, but for the most part, it's not smart to be so spread out. We shut the door securely after we enter.

Mai, Takumi and Reito sit around a low table, eating what was left of a stale box of cereal. Mai looks up excitedly when Chie enters,

"Well?" She prods.  
>"We're going to think about it some more." Chie responds with a tone of mocking, motioning towards me.<p>

I decide to throw all caution to the wind, "If all of you want to go so badly, go. You don't need my permission."  
>"It'd be better if we stuck as a group." Mai insists.<br>"It'd be best if we stayed in Fuuka." I shoot back.  
>"Shizuru, I'm eating cardboard here."<br>"Maybe. That's all I'm saying now."  
>"A 'maybe' is better than yesterday," Mai elbows Chie jokingly, as Chie sits down.<br>"Okay okay." Chie signals for it to be dropped.

We then sit at the table quietly, eating sparingly, listening to the white-noise crackle of the dying handheld radio Takumi tightly grips.

The little toy is something we found weeks ago and spend another couple of weeks trying to find batteries for. All it can do though is spit out stupid static. Nothing useful has come through since it's been working.

Unexpectedly, the little thing changes static tunes. It catches everyone's attention at the small variation, but indicates nothing valuable yet. Takumi quickly fiddles with the antenna, while we all lose interest as he gets nowhere with the task. Setting the handset finally down on the table, giving up, Takumi put his head down on his hands.

"Turn it off, you're wasting battery." Mai advises. Her brother nods and reaches for the radio.

"B-23… tango echo charlie… clear for…" A voice penetrates the emptiness of the room and re-sparks the our attention. Eyes glue themselves to the device.

The redhead boy grabs the thing and seems nearly ready to shake more information out of it.

"…climbing…control… unstable…may-…" The voice sounds distinctly militarized.

_A rescue party?_ The first thoughts can't be stopped. They are instinct. Hopeless, stupid, immature instincts to say: 'maybe this is it', 'maybe this is it', 'maybe they're here'.

"Takumi! Say something!" Mai orders, breaking the stunned silence. The small radio is a handset, but has a two-way feature, quite luckily.

"Hey, is anybody out there? We're also survivors living in the suburb of Fuuka here. Are there any others?"

_Crackle freaking crackle._ Annoyance builds with each passing second or so, with each crackle that meant nothing is left. The group waits impatiently. There is not a good signal, it is not a far-range machine, and on top of it all, the thing is dying.

"… anybody… another… there?..." The machine is on the fritz but we listen to what they can.  
>I hear something of interest, "Kuga Na-… Shibuy-" The radio mellows out as the batteries give out.<p>

I can see that she's crying too. Crystals leak out her precious green eyes. It's so difficult to get around the mob, how can I reach her? I start shoving as well. I need to reach her. I can't leave her alone...

That's when I notice the military's line is broken. There are staggering figures coming from the opposite direction now. Right behind Natsuki, where she is not looking, but being carried.

Gaping stares fill the room. At some point we must've stood up, because we're all standing now, leaning in to the voices. They turn to me knowing all too well what was heard.

"Natsuki…?" I breathe word everyone else does not want to say.

"Natsuki." With some kind of divine intervention, I'm able to reach her through the crowd. I see what I wish I didn't and I act in the only way that I can. I switch places with her, whipping her around.

Then I feel the impact of what would've happened to her. The force of the mouth tears through my coat, and pierces my shoulder. I feel the moment slow. I'm on my knees now and I pull my head upwards to see her stunned face and struggling body one last time before she gets swept up by the current.

My mind refreshes, "That was her voice! That was her!" I practically scream with enthusiasm. I stand upright throwing the chair backwards, "That was her!"  
>"Shizuru," Reito's voice is sturdy and warning, "Let's not jump to conclusions…"<br>That pained expression. That terrible last glance. The last teary glimpse of the center of my heart.

"Kuga Na-? Who else?" I smile excitedly. "It was her voice! I know it, I heard it."

Moving to the door, someone catches my arm.  
>"Shizuru, I don't think-" They try to calm me, to force me back to reality. They know the dangers of false hope like no one else on the planet ever did.<p>

"Shibuya! She said it, we'll go there. We'll go get her!"  
>"And get supplies?" Chie chimes quietly.<br>"Sure supplies, whatever, but we're going there now!" I try to shrug off Mai's hand, growing more irritated at their pathetic excuses.  
>"Shizuru this isn't smart. This isn't like you. Think through this first."<br>"We're going to go get her." I persist.

"Shibuya is in the middle of Tokyo, we aren't going in that far." Reito reminds strategically.  
>"Yes we are!" I yell, feeling the tears start to sting my face. Remembering the same tears from the train-tracks; the tears on my beloved's face.<p>

"It might not even be her. Kuga could be anyone." More reality from Mai.  
>"Tokyo's a big place. She'd be hard to find <em>if<em> it _is_ her." Another reality-bitchslap from Reito.

"But if not her, then there's someone out there," I remind.  
>"One person isn't worth all six of us."<br>"Of course she is!" I can feel all the anxiety building, all the pain. Half a year of lag of this memory makes everything that much worse. All the harder to not scream and demand instant answers. All the harder to stay put, but also to know the actuality of her survival since that day. The reality that Natsuki won't be there and the message wasn't her.

Not seeing persuasion, I put my harshest card onto the table, "If it were Mikoto, or Aoi, or Akira, What would you do?" Recalling everyone's favorite people, easily strumming all the emotional chords at once.

"This isn't-"  
>"It's exactly the same!"<p>

"I think she's right. We should go." Chie looks up, eyes glazed.  
>"No way. We have a sanctuary here! It isn't smart to leave it."<br>"And what? Sit here forever? We need supplies anyway."  
>"We'll go to somewhere closer to Fuuka, not Shibuya." It seems we've switched positions in our debate to leave the apartment building from earlier.<p>

"Mai, we could sit here and cower until this whole deal blows over, or we could go out and help someone. It would mean more of a chance if we have more survivors together."  
>"You mean go down with a fight?" Mai's voice has sarcasm laced into it.<br>"If we would all go, we won't 'go down' at all." Chie jumps in.

"Enough." Reito intervenes, "What if we take a quick trip into Tokyo in the car?"  
>"You're siding with them?"<br>"The car works again?"

"Nao fixed it. Yes, I think we could take a quick swing. Chie has a point. We could sit here until someone else makes a move or we could go make a move ourselves."

"This is stupid. Takumi?" Takumi nods to Mai's discontent.

I, still standing at the doorway, bound out into the hallway to gather decent supplies. Some things that are lightweight, durable, and useful for something like a two day trip.

_I'm on my way, Natsuki. Don't give up._

"Someone go tell Nao we're leaving."

* * *

><p>Reviews are great :) Love to know what you think. Continue?<p> 


	3. Hell

**Fallen ~**

Thank you everyone so much for reviewing! It keeps me going to see that people are reading it. I love you guys.

I think this is really an over-simplified version of what could happen as an apocalypse. There's so many other things that could be going on. Don't mind that.

Just went through it again for mistakes that were pointed out to me. Hope it's better.

**Chapter 3**

**Hell ~**

"Hey," I walk up and place a gentle hand on her shoulder, "I'm sorry. It'll be alright."  
>I'm answered with a sniff and glistening eyes as they turn to meet me, "You already said that," She looks back at the coffin.<p>

I shrug nonchalantly, trying to ease the pain and tension, "I know," I hesitantly move my hand to hers. "I thought you needed to hear it again." She grabs my offered hand readily and squeezes. I squeeze back, to comfort her.  
>I know she's crying, even with her back to me, the way her head is lowered, the sounds she makes.<br>"It's okay." I reassure quietly.

She turns then, and inhales it all in, taking that breath she won't let out, that will be her shield to the world. But she'd also already had enough crying during the service.

"You know better than anymore," She says.  
>"I suppose." I say briefly, it isn't bragging rights and I'd rather not linger on it.<p>

She breathes clearly now and we begin to amble to the exit. She changes the topic quickly.  
>"A suit, Natsuki?" She smiles, peeking at me from her peripherals.<br>"I was told to wear it." I defend, looking at nothing but straight ahead, but thinking that it is a rather overdressed choice of clothing for a July day.  
>She exhales a quick puff of air through her nose as a bitter representation of a laugh, still smiling casually, "You look good."<br>I murmur, "You do too."

She swings our hands lightheartedly as we walk. I let her do it.

We're outside then.  
>"Do you need a ride?" I offer blatantly.<br>"I have to go talk to some people first."  
>"Oh… Will you be alright?" I add.<p>

"I'll be fine." She smiles to assure me. She drops my hand and everything starts to melt.  
>She is drifting away from me.<br>"Okay Nao."

* * *

><p>Forcefully sitting up straight, I violently unleash a bullet into open air.<p>

I hold my chest as I try to regain proper breathing and calm my erratic heartbeat. I silently wish for a cigarette.

I shake my head vigorously. Screw these flashbacks. They seem to be growing more frequent. My thoughts only want to mess with me. They give me a glimpse back into what I had, only to seize it just out of my reach once again. I can place exactly where each one goes into my life timeline when they occur.

Why such specific memories? Why not one of the bigger events during the starting of this new world shit? This one, I know, is from the summer Shizuru went back to Kyoto.

_Shizuru…_ I drone, feeling that sickened sensation briefly return. I have nothing from her to remember her by. No words to linger on, no item to hold close to my heart. No, only the memories. _How much longer until every mention of you doesn't make my stomach churn in sorrow._

_Why did you save me? What made you do that? Do you know the guilt crushes me now? I'm not worth it, not like this._

I mentally slap myself back to reality. I curse when I realize what I've done: wasted ammo and made noise. But all I can do is pound sand. I'll need to visit some depot again to re-supply.

I push myself off the floor strongly, revived. I brush caked blood off my face then scratch what I can off of my shirt. I could also use some new clothes. With Japan's fall quickly winding down, it's getting colder every night.

I'm still unsure of what happened to me earlier, medically speaking. But whatever it was seems to have passed and has no further crude effects now, save for the small stomachache (which could just be the hunger).

I've never had that happen. The more I think about it, the more it worries me. Could I have some developed health condition now? Is something wrong with me? Am I overdoing it (what other choices do I have)? This worries me because well, what can I do for that? There's no doctors left.

I had been far more concerned earlier, as I dragged myself into another building with a suddenly exhausted amount of energy, if it were a bite…

I need to clear out of here. Move along. You gotta keep running to stay alive. It's a lobby of some sort. My mind wanders briefly through what kind of layout a place like this would have. Shibuya has many fancy department stores and they each vary from one another. It might have multiple entrances on this floor. Other rooms, blind corners, dead ends, windows, stairs, storage closets, there are so many small preferences per building it gets tiresome to have to recheck my checklist for each and every place I go. It has definitely become something of a nervous habit. Like everything else I do now.

It might not be the best idea to have to live exclusively like this: having to scurry from place to place. It's not smart, but there are things I could be doing that would be stupider.

I seem to have attracted a bit of attention already, if they were not already waiting at the door. Scratches and inhuman sounds plead outside a sliding glass department store door. I hold my breath. Unconquerable fear eating away my insides. I freeze up just like every time they're so damn close.

I could think in my logical patterns, but I can't.  
>I could run, but I can't.<br>I could scream, but I can't.

Something behind me snaps me out of my thoughts and causes a feeling of being gut-punched. Pushing blindly through boxes and shelves, chasing the shots they must've heard, is another small herd of them. I feel all the usual tenseness I get around these things. That frozen helplessness does nothing but nag on me. Why me? Why _only _me? Why is everything so alone?

I'm feeling shaky. What is the best decision here? Which way? I grab my firearm and hold it out. I dumbly fire at the ones inside the building with me.

I feel so distressed I shut my eyes. The sound of a close gunshot makes the blood boil in your ears. I hear it three times over before it stops. I open my eyes, confused. Still pulling that trigger back, I hear a different sound. Clicking. It's out.

You're joking. I hastily glimpse up at the oncoming figures. Three more and probably more on the way now. I switch between glances of them and scanning the room for an exit. I unconsciously back myself up until I hit that glass door. When my back feels hitting a surface, I jump, not expecting the wall to be so close.

The suddenly, they're on top of me. The ones inside the building have drifted closer. Dear god.

I use that ancient fight or flight thinking and do what I can. Ducking, I swing my leg around to trip them.

Then I bound up with an enthused amount of energy and race to the nearest door. I find another hallway behind it and head down it. My fear pushing me all the way. I believe I've stumbled onto offices and dead ends. But thinking fast, I remember this is only the first floor and if there is a window anywhere, I could escape from it. It's a cycle really. Get into the building, get back out, get into another seemingly-safe place, get back out.

Trying one of the western door handles of the corporate building, it's locked. I step back and take a breath. I kick downwards at the door to no avail. Breaking down door is hard to do. I've already had to do it a couple times whist living in this hell. It can be done, even with a rather scrawny build like my own. It takes a couple of tries, but it falls inwards, broken free of its hinges with a splintering of the wood.

At the perfect distance not to be crushed by the falling door is another melting face I'd rather not look at. Still having not retreated my leg after the door had fallen in, the thing grabs at me. I move away just in time to evade the first attack, but these diseased people are fucking relentless.

I let out a surprised shriek as it pulls me down. I struggle like there's no tomorrow (an expression which has never been more literal and applicable). It's game over if they catch you. You can be in all the enclosed areas you want with fifty of them and still have better chances than if a single one has you in it's grasp. When this was still just a beginning problem, I saw people go down just like that. Unsuspecting, good people. This is the last thing I want to be doing, being anywhere _close_ to one of them.

With no ammo left, all I can do is squirm. It has its mouth and open and ready for me; I can't tell you how bad it looks. Nothing feels worse then this position now.

_Holy shit_, I dawns on me, _what if this is totally it?_ After all I've been working for... No, that's too fast. Not with daylight streaming in through that window.

I'm filled with an indescribable horror and disgust as the body crawls around, moving up my lower body more. I try my best to keep it back with both of my legs and therefore cannot do much damage to it while holding it away like this. God, I wish this would stop.

As the thing tries to move again, I am finally that opportunity to kick it away with one free foot. I scramble up as soon as it detaches. I look down the hallway back to where I came from.

_What hell is this?_ There are more people at the end coming this way. _No way. Why is this never ending?_

* * *

><p>"And nobody thought to ask me what I thought of this little scheme?"<br>"Nobody gives a shit what you think, Yuuki."

Nao still hears the quiet, snide comment and jingles the keys mockingly. Reito immediately puts on a fake smile sarcastically.

"Natsuki's out there." I reply to the original comment, feeling determined, I shut the trunk.  
>"Stop saying that. Natsuki's fucking dead." I look over to find Nao leant on the doorframe, lazily examining the scenery. I'm not taking that from her. I stride over and jerk her out of her reverie suddenly as I snatch her hair.<p>

"You shut up Yuuki." My voice is eerily gruff yet calm. With that being said however, I am completely willing to rip the girl's head off her neck.  
>Reito rushes up to us, taking hold of my shoulders. I can guess he understands my sensitivity on this subject.<p>

"Shizuru," He warns stiffly. I'm still dead set on giving Nao what's been coming to her, but I let up, seeing the downside of that action. Though I have one final tug to engrave my point before releasing the red hair and sulking away.

"Fucking hell Fujino!" Nao cries, rubbing the back of her head, "I'm not driving her anywhere." She shakes her head over-dramatically.

"Then I'll drive myself," I'm ready to punch the girl's lights out, and I head right for her before being caught by the shoulders again by Reito. Nao holds up the keys insultingly, waving them in front of my face. I'm about to scream my irritation, but Reito covers my mouth,

"Not worth it, Shi." He says curtly, using his full effort to restrain me in my fit. He gives me one final shove away and what more can I do but walk away from the scene, then take my seat in the car.

Reito went straight up to Nao after that, "And you, quit it." He says, being the parent in the situation, smacking her forehead. "Stay here." Reito shoves the handgun in her hands once more.

He goes inside leaving Nao to rub her forehead. He later emerges with the three others and the everyone loads into the car soundlessly. We're finally ready to go. I keep my mind on that one face I want so badly to see again. That last image of her I have at the train station. _Natsuki..._

Nao starts the engine. After three unsuccessful tries the car purrs to life. A relieving sound.

Fuuka being the small community it once was, there are not many walkers lingering. Perfect cruising for a fixed up Mitsubishi.

Sitting in the back, Reito leans over to me. I sit glowering, "Don't get our hopes up, okay?"

_It's really to late for that Reito._

* * *

><p>I'm a filmmaker and I'm finding it difficult to put so much detail and emotion into words.<br>Please give me feedback on it. Thanks readers!

Sorry for the brevity of this chapter.


	4. Almost

**Fallen ~**

Took a shot of 5-hour-energy and whipped this chapter out in 4 hours, specially for Natsuki's birthday (that I totally did not forget about until just now xD).

Did some re-editing. Screwed with some details and POVs.

**Chapter Four**

**Almost ~**

I browse lazily through the rack of coats, looking for something warm. Something to get me through these increasingly-chilly nights. It's hard to find anything because when the world fell apart, nobody was preparing for winter. Six months ago, we were all coming out of the winter, ready to strip off all the coats. So there isn't much heavy clothing on the shelf. I systematically sort each of these prestigious shopping district coat racks. Lots of them have fur rims like I would expect from a high end district like this. I'm looking for something waterproof… with pockets and nicely insulated, that'd be good.

I glance up every now and then to survey the area around me. But I'm not all that concerned; I lost any tail I had hours ago. I'm sure of it. Then I cleaned out this floor of this store with a much quieter weapon. I stumbled upon a pipe earlier. Useful thing. I still have it clenched in with the blackened knuckles of my right fist. Maybe I'm still a bit jumpy (and paranoid, as always) because of that close call earlier.

It's hard to see much in the interior of the ninth floor of this clothing store. Lights haven't been working since god-knows-when. The only light is coming in through the smashed glass windows of this skyscraper. It has a gorgeous view of the close-to-setting sun. A distinct sunset tan glows over the merchandise in the country that used to be the land of the _rising_ sun. If only that title still held motivation...

It isn't smart for me to loiter around here, with no security except my awake self. Another day gone, I'm in another new place, I should be looking for a safe place to sleep. I especially shouldn't be up high like this, on these upper floors of the buildings. Even though it usually has limited activity, it is hard to get back down if you attract any attention, and there are only so many routes back down.

I find a sweater I like and pull it off it's hanger to size it up, not like looks matter anymore anyway.

A noise at the other end of the level startles me enough to drop the outfit. There's no visual to match up with the sound. This makes me more on edge because I can't find the source. To hear creaking where there should be none, to feel footsteps knock on the floor when there is nothing there.  
>It would put anybody on edge, wouldn't it? I wait, stapled to my spot, until I see a lone misshapen head bob above the racks. This makes me chest tighter. I thought I boarded the doorway…?<p>

I must've sucked in my breath a little too loudly. The decaying face turns slowly to face exactly where I am. Then I find myself unable to breathe. I can't understand how their senses are still so intact.

Scuffling on another side catches my attention quickly. Again, I see nothing. Nervously, I check under the racks to see if anything is on the ground. Only the bodies I've leveled, and the persistent legs of the one other that has seen me. I decide to crawl to the nearest exit.

Shopping is over and I'm reminded of the hideousness of this new reality. The reality that I'm not alone, but I'm also completely on my own.

If there was anyone else. Anyone to stay with me. This peril of a lifestyle could maybe be that much more livable. It would have more of a meaning.  
>Is anyone else out there?<br>Why am I still fighting? Maybe it was seeing those helicopters that has brightened my day, but I've seen no one else on the ground so far in six months.

What is all of this worth?

I manage to inch myself closer to the shattered windows. Nowhere near the main stairwell of this floor. I would have to cross that walker's path and now he's searching for me I can't get over there.

I'm too antsy to rest for a moment to catch my panicky breathing. I can't let my guard down. I can't stop.

So with my senses at peak like this, I hear something interesting from far away. I take a debated second to look down out the window. At this height, I would probably die if I fell. I think briefly about letting myself drop over the edge. Again, this more-than-loneliness pain hits me.

I have a good view of a main street below, I muse. It stretches on far beyond Shibuya in a straight line through Tokyo. I can see all the activity still lightly buzzing. All the bodies walking who make me grind my teeth in stifled fear, all the smoke, all the discarded rubbish, and the shape moving steadily down the street in the shape of a… car…?

_A car? A car! It's totally a moving car. _I already decide it's something special, wanting so badly to believe in it._ Holy god, someone is down there!_ My excitement goes through the roof. Absolutely beyond what normal thought would allow me to accept. _I'm seeing others for the second time today even!_

But this has happened before, with a military vehicle, when everything was just starting to die down from all of the initial insanity. I don't care to think about that memory, of how it was overrun with zombies as it sped by, unable to stop. A runaway truck. I don't want to dash my hopes away so soon, which have become so high now. I don't want to think about any other options. Only about other survivors. Only about rescue parties searching the city.

I watch it closely to test it. Listening to the inconsistent sound of the engine to signal that there is a driver changing speeds. Watching it steer around debris. _Yes! It has at least one person in it! Someone else! It has to be! _ I give myself no time to think of other options. It's been a while since I had something to believe in, an actual goal to reach. The helicopters did not spark this same _reachable_ hope I have now.

I jump to my feet, I need to get down to the street. I have less fear for the thing that again to turns to me. The power of the possibilities of my suddenly brightened future propelling me all the way. I know I can power through him, and the others I know are waiting, I will reach that goddamn car. I will make myself known. It is just far enough away for me to have time to get back down. God, why did I ever come up to the ninth floor? I scold myself.

Hitting this once living thing harshly over the head, I don't watch the gruesome fall. I run on to the stairs. Another obstacle awaits me. I had boarded this doorway with a desk earlier. I can see that it has been moved enough for a person at a time to fit through. I take it then that there is nothing else behind here, otherwise they would've already come through.

Making the least sound I can, I push the table aside.

But I'm ambushed. Sort of. A collapsed body squirming, missing a number of limbs, lies across the stairs. I know in some logical part of my mind I want to look away. But I cannot right away. The way the tendons of it's former appendages still string out, the way it's eyes stare into mine. The way it knows I'm here, it's aware of me, but can't really do anything about it in it's crippled state.  
>I know this was a real person sometime. Maybe with a family and friends. A life.<p>

And how cruel life can be.

I leave the thing and race over it. I don't have time to stall or energy to waste on it. _My_ life still has a chance. Rushing down the staircase, I almost trip countless times but do not encounter any others of the undead. I allow myself a sigh of relief, of victory.

That until, of course, I reach the first floor of this department store. That pit in my stomach not only drops, but drops and falls out of my ass and rolls away. A gathering of forty or something (and that's a rational number, it feels more like a hundred) walkers mill about, stuck, unable to go up the stairs.

I hear the roar of an engine grow. The car I had been watching from upstairs zips by. And that's it. Poof. There it goes. I feel the same way as a child who has been separated from their parent. A really true, pure, sinking alarm.

There goes everything. I can't see anyone in the car, it's going too fast. And I certainly can't get their attention from in here. _Fuck_, if only I had bullets left… What the hell do I do now?

_What the hell... _Stuck in thinking, I let myself fall away.

I've been struggling for so long. Too long. Too long have I not been able to quench my thirst with a decent glass of water, or feed my hunger with a full meal, or hug the one I love. This has been too long.  
><em>I've been doing it all for you, Shizuru.<em>

I know I've fallen now, and I can't get back up. _Not on my own, Shi._

I give in. With nowhere else to go (I know there are no other staircases to get around this), I make the final descent into the swarm and start swinging with my stupid pipe.

* * *

><p>"That was Shibuya station!" Chie announces, kneeling in her seat. I squirm uncomfortably. I don't want to see any train stations. Unfortunatly, the memories hits me faster than I can block it.<p>

Natsuki's face swims in my head. Through a crowd of people.

"What?" Mai questions. "That?"  
>"Yeah, that building." Chie tries to point out specifically which building. I don't need to see the exact building, but I extract what information I can out of that phrase.<p>

"Then we're in already Shibuya!" I conclude excitedly. "Turn around!"  
>"What? Are you shitting me? No way." Nao scoffs.<p>

"Shibuya station is on the far west side of the district, we're almost out of it! Turn around." I recite geography that I remember. I might appear almost frantic, but I try to keep my usual demeanor. They wouldn't know it, but I want to get as far away as possible from the station.

I remember exactly the last second I saw her face, what expression she was making... concern. Anxiety and fear etched all over her features. That's the way I've recalled her for six months now.

And until just recently over the radio, with what I believe to be her voice, just like the way I remember her voice, I've memorized her last words to me.

Nao obeys as no one else in the group objects, and does a U-turn at the nearest clear intersection.

"And go slower." I say, "We're never going to find anything at this speed."  
>"And what are we looking for Shizuru-san?"<br>"Activity."

* * *

><p>So this is how it ends, I think slowly. Being held by the down by the neck, scarcely fending off being bitten, staring up into the soggy eyes of one of the army of the living dead. I never would have believed this a few months ago.<p>

Nope. I'm not laid flat on my back, arms pinned down. I'm back in my apartment. A voice drifts to me, I can hear it,

"What's wrong, Natsuki?"

I look around. The voice is all too familiar, it hurts me to think about it.

"You look unhappy." Arms encircle my shoulders from behind. I receive a kiss on the cheek. I know this moment, this dialogue.

"I'm sorry Shizuru," I cringe. This is part of the script. I know this memory and my lines from it.

"What makes Natsuki so miserable?" She teases. She's not dead.

"It's nothing." I squeeze out through my choked airway, speaking to no one, but seeing a completely different setting.

"You've been drifting away from me." Her face turns serious, turning the discussion. She stands and wanders to my desk. She sifts through my papers idly.

"No, Shizuru," I try to talk to her.

"What is it, Natsuki? What have you been doing?" It bothers me to wonder if she still means in the time from the memory, or now.

"Nothing." It's one of our back and forth, one-word bullshit conversations I remember. I know they were more than BS to Shizuru. She was always trying to get me to open up more. To not be so secretive like the life I had gotten used to, from chasing down my own backstory.

And now, alone at this time, these moments mean more to me too.  
>However, I don't know why my subconscious choses this specific episode to play; a time when she was fairly exasperated with me. Maybe punishment.<p>

_I'm sorry I couldn't save you, Shi._ I apologize as my mind drifts. That's sat with me for so long and I want nothing more to tell her that in person. To have that weight lifted. To know she's okay.

"Uh-huh." She nods, but doesn't buy that. "You won't tell me. Where have you been?"

My eyes blur from the tears, it's getting harder to breathe, "Shizuru," I gasp out. It feels good to finally allow myself to say her name and to finally let myself remember her beautiful face. It's been so long since I've seen your breathtaking face.  
><em>I've been trying so hard for you, Shizuru. Believe me, I have missed you.<em>

"What?" She responds to her name rather coldly, waiting for me to say whatever it is I'm going to say. I know what I will say next in the memory, but I don't want to answer that way again. I want to talk to her. I want to be with her again.

She's a mixture of upset and interested now. "What is it that you truly want?" This seems like a change in what she has been asking me, but it's the correct phrasing of what she wants to ask. I understand.

"I want you," I get through suffocating lips, "to stay here." I add new lines to this memory, that I've replayed so many times, unwilling to return to my crumbling reality.

She tilts her head delicately, listening. She must not remember this part of our conversation because I'm just creating it. She gives me a look to continue, like I know she would do.

"Stay with me." I repeat, sputtering, having the metal rod I'm holding be forced onto my windpipe, unable to tell her more.

She is still stood in the middle of our apartment living room, arms crossed, listening to my last words. She looks disapproving. But it slowly changes, to disappointment... because I've stopped trying.  
>I know her reasoning is for me and because of that, that uncontainable love she has always given me, I want to see her again… so badly… and I'll see her soon enough now. <em>It won't be long now until I have you in my arms again, Shizuru.<em>

The empty face above me opens it's mouth, ready to take, and I am ready to be taken now,

_I'm coming, Shizuru._ I think as I finally quit, screaming my heart out, "I want to go home!"

Then a shout, tagged along with gunfire, "Natsuki?"

* * *

><p>I don't mean to break the apocalypse high, but please review. I love feedback.<p>

I'll have the next up soon. I was going to make this one longer by combining this chapter and the next, but I wanted to get something out for Natsuki's birthday ;)


	5. Happy

**Fallen ~**

Thank you reviewers. I heard that cliffhanger drove you crazy. I guess I'm doing my job.

Since Fuuka isn't a real place, I'm thinking Fuuka would be a suburb of Tokyo on the far western border where the municipality ends. Shibuya and Shinjuku are center-Tokyo and Yokohama is south of that.

Fallen has turned into the single most OCD project I've ever had myself work on, because of all it's ongoing-ness and the explanation and backstory I'm trying to add to it all. This story has me by the throat. I hope you're all enjoying it as much as I am xD

**Chapter Five**

**Happy ~**

I know the walker's attention is drawn elsewhere, except for the one that has me pinned. He's so close to his goal. He wants nothing more than to tear into my flesh that he's been working so hard to get. I cringe with my eyes still squeezed shut.

I'm not sure what it is exactly that has happened, but the sounds are vibrating the floor I'm laying on. I fear that it is explosions from mines set by the military months ago that are being tripped. Making that conclusion, I continue to be disinterested in the world around me anymore. I'll the fireworks take my life. I'm going to lie here and let it happen. What do I have left to fight for now?

But then the best part comes, bursting through my subconscious and all the groans echoes voices. _Voices?_ _The walkers can't speak._ I have to double check these aren't coming from my head. From my painful memories.

I remember her smile. I can see it now. I remember the last moment I saw her.

"Natsuki?" A single word is called out. How does…? Someone knows my name… but, the sound of it… the way it's pronounced…

I open my eyes again, truly not expecting to light again. I watch in horror as the head bobbing just above my own is jerked to the side as if someone pulled it down, alongside a distinct gunshot. I feel the bitter splatter of blood onto my open skin. I have to close my eyes again, but I am able to gasp in complete breathes of air finally, as soon as the weight is taken off my neck. I exhale a large puff to clear the fluid away from my mouth, like how you would breathe if water had been dumped over your head.

I cough and can't get enough air into my lungs. I sit up at a slant, leaning back on my elbows before something has me by the shoulders. It almost seems too advanced in technique to be a crawler. I struggle insanely nonetheless, not giving myself the chance to think clearly (or breathe really). I open my eyes, netted down with remains of a point-blank zombie shot. I continue to squirm defensively, trying to keep the body away from me. I turn behind me to see what has me in such a grip. What I see I can only explain as 'surprises me'.

"You are alive."

Shizuru is standing on that godforsaken station platform again. She has her coat on. The dark, long one that is perfect for this gloomy, spring weather. It doesn't have a hood, so her poor sandy hair is matted down from the drizzle.

I spot her out easily from the flowing crowd. She has been waiting for me. I'm given the genuine smile I will remember as clear as day for the next six months, from the face of the woman I will grow to miss too much.

I readjust my satchel as I approach her. One of the military soldiers standing as part of the perimeter tells us to keep moving. He stands ready with some type of heavy machine gun. I wonder if he knows where his family is in all of this chaos.

Next, I know it's about now, that the gunfire breaks out behind us. Frantic shooting. Unprofessional, scared shooting. A majority of the evacuating crowd turns to see the fuss behind them. Then the panic sets in. The Tokyo civilians start running. Shoving anything in their path to get to the loading train.

I've never liked crowds. I try to stay close to Shizuru. I can see other families and friends that have the same idea, but a panicked mob is like a tidal wave.

"Natsuki?" I hear again. I feel my eyes defrost and I look to find that most of the walkers in the room have been brought down. I sit astonished.

It's the same way she called me on the train platform. When we were getting separated. The same shrill tone of searching.

I'm able to grab her coat for nothing more than a second, before she is ripped away from me. "Natsuki!" My name is screamed. She's getting pushed away. I find her worried face, apart from everybody else. A part of me knows to cherish this, to take in every last detail of her from this moment, complete with her newly tear-stained, stunning red eyes. But the other part of me doesn't want to accept this as a last glimpse of her. This other part of my mind is fogging my rational thoughts, lying: 'it will all be okay.'

I blankly stare at the figure that is lifting me to my feet, "…Kanzaki?" I recognize the face. I don't quite catch myself and my knees give as I'm stood upright. I'm too dazed, stuck in a deep murkiness.

"Natsuki!" I try to piece this shout to my memory. But it sounds too happy and excited to fit into the scene at the train station. I stumble forward shakily, tearing myself away of the man's arms that helped me up. I'm adrift with my depth perception, not really taking in my surroundings. Not sure what to think or feel now. What is going...

Sound dulls as Shizuru reaches her hand through the overwhelming crowd. I watch her mouth cry to me, form words. I watch her slowly, but I hear nothing.

I stare idly into space, lost in the simple room. I feel the force of another body grab me with quite the momentum, almost knocking me over on my wobbly legs. Another cheek brushes mine, and arms clutch desperately around my neck. This motion nearly makes me jump back, like I've been training myself to do. But the enthusiastic face nuzzles deeply on my shoulder, stopping me dead, and then I'm gazing at maple hair. "It is you." I'm told.

I know she eventually reaches me against all the people, only to push me away. I reel backwards, being hit by more passing frenzied people. I don't understand what she has done until I look up at her again. It hits me then and there how real this evacuation is. All the newscasts, all the military tanks, all the people with suitcases, all the screaming, and all the zombies _are real_.

Zombie is not a word I want to use. And maybe everyone else is thinking the same, and that's what causing our hysterical fear: the idea that it's other _people_ after us. Relentless masses of other people so similar to ourselves literally _chasing_ the shit out of us. That might be why everyone is so afraid.  
>But against everything else, I don't want to hear 'zombie'. That's not a future I want to think about with that word to explain all this.<p>

I didn't feel this same emotion I feel now merely by seeing the peeling faces of the infected people (I'm particular not to think of them as undead yet) until now... Until I had to see the one I love have her shoulder pierced by human teeth, have her future killed, for me. All and only for me. She took a bite for me.

"Oh god, Natsuki, it's really you." A familiar voice raves as they grasp me in a bone-crushing hug. "It is you. It is you. I knew you were out here. I knew you were alive."

She sits there helplessly, blood absolutely gushing out between her fingers, her hand squeezing her new wound hard enough to turn her knuckles white. She has crumpled to the ground, recoiling from the attack. The crowd finally shrieks at the appearance of this walker in the mix.

No one sees my girl. She gets kicked and hit in the flurry, having to kneel at people's feet level. This last image I have of her: doubled over, dying, and I can't get back to her.

"Shizuru…" I mumble, fizzling out of my trance. Irreplaceable red eyes glance up to meet mine. I search the face in front of me; I fight between what I know as current reality and what is reminiscence. I stiffly bring my arms around her back.

"How is this…?" I don't finish. I don't care. Not now. I embrace the warm body resiliently. I shut off everything else, encasing myself in this long-lost contact from her.

If this is a dream, don't wake me.

* * *

><p>I'm shoved into the backseat of a Mitsubishi. Or rather, Shizuru pulls me in with her. I fall onto her lap, squished next to two boys in the back with us, and three other girls in the front. Then Shizuru continues our lip lock.<p>

I'm too dazed to be alert. Nothing around me matters anymore. I didn't bother to scan the area habitually when we ran outside to the car, and I hadn't cared about what was in the car before tumbling in.

I kiss her back eagerly, like at any second she will be taken from me again. Her hands run over my sunburnt face longingly. I feel it from her touch: she has missed me too.

Her hands are just as rough and seasoned as mine. No longer the sweet skin I once knew. I grab one of her hands and try my best to rub away the calluses, slipping our palms together.

Somehow, I feel guilt, being with her now. Guilt that I couldn't save her at the station… she was left there.

She looks up and gasps a short laugh, just for the sake of seeing my face again. Tears stream out of the red eyes I've missed so much. Exactly like I left her at the station. I can only stare, but I'm thinking, '_Don't cry, Shi.'_

It doesn't feel real. I can't believe this. I can't believe _in_ this. What if she is still on that platform waiting for me? From the last truth I know, she is still stuck there, being kicked by the world, being run over and alone.

I'm going to wake up soon and smack myself silly for dreaming like this. I love it; I love her, but I can't accept it.

Or maybe I'm dead. Maybe that walker got me and this is where my mind has wandered off to now.

I feel a hand on my cheek, caressing me back to where I really am. It has become harder than ever to live through these past months. I'm supposed to be awake, but I don't want to be. I'm supposed to be attentive, but I'm not. I'm supposed to be alive, but I can't stop seeing my past that make me sick, that makes me think I don't deserve to live.

Her face turns solemn, seeing my stifled uncertainty. I take an upset breath in through my nose, pulling away from her.

The car is moving. The train is pulling out of the station.  
>It's being flooded. And I'm suddenly worried about the possible walker-pursuit of the car.<br>They've stopped taking people on board. Yet desperate, scared people jump and hang onto the sides. The train is being mobbed.  
>The car has already started off and has no current threats.<p>

Of course I try to go back to where I last saw her. But I don't find her.  
>She skims over my back with a gentle hand, holding my hand in the other.<p>

"Here, Natsuki," A man's voice behind me pulls fabric over my head. This wakes me up like I've been dunked in ice water. At first I think it's bag and I instinctively struggle to breathe and shriek. I flail until Shizuru catches my arms. I realize then that it's only a sweater. A nice warm, wool sweater. Perfect for fall turning winter.

I inhale. I almost feel their perplexed stares at my behavior. I know Shizuru understands. She secures her arms around me on her lap and hugs me. This relaxes me slightly but I dispute what I should do in response in my head.

"Is this real?" I spill out of my mouth, looking at the other faces, trying so hard to get a grasp of what's happening, trying to catch my breath. I feel the peck on the cheek Shizuru gives me and she answers, "Of course, Natsuki."

That fire of guilt, aching, and sadness is almost dowsed. Shizuru is really here. I cough and choke on tears, then snuggle nervously into the nook of her neck. She places her chin on the top of my head happily. I steady my breathing, and the idea that I can do so helps me decide that: This. Is. Reality.

Looking around the car, I notice everyone is giggling at us. This would be awkward normally, but it's too amazing. Out of all of Tokyo, all of Japan, and the entire world, we've found each other again. We've all found each other again.

I laugh, exhaling, and finally allow myself to lean back comfortably into the embrace. Shizuru squeezes me in that way when you can't get enough of someone and all you can really do is hold them close. I continue to grip her hand, almost afraid to see what would happen if I let go.

I exchange greetings with everyone in the car gladly. Mai is here, also her brother. Nao is driving, Reito gave me the sweater, and Chie is here too. This really is an insane, small world.

I'd really like to ask the beauty who's holding me something now, "How are you alive?" I change the mood quickly. The rest of the group stares, unaware.

"You were bit." I continue absentmindedly, thinking about the last time we saw each other.  
>That's when the classic egotistical fear overcomes the love of others. They all jump back and shout at her. Immediately there is a group effort to keep us on a separated side of the car. I say 'us' because I stay with her, in her lap. I look at everybody else weird. I have made up my mind to trust her. She's not one of them...<p>

"Why didn't you tell us anything?" Nao yells, glancing between the obstacle-course-of-a-street and us behind her.  
>"When did this happen?" Reito is angry too.<br>"Why _aren't_ you dead?" Mai sounds irate but also interested.  
>But above all, they all sound scared as hell. They don't want to spend another second in the same car with Shizuru after what I just told them.<p>

"It was a while ago," Shizuru explains, averting everyone's eyes. "I don't think it went deep enough to do anything." She shrugs it off.

"You know damn well just a scratch can send someone to their death here." Chie protests angrily.

"I-" She starts but is interrupted by me, pulling down the right shoulder of her shirt. I'm interested too. Did I just imagine all of what I saw that time at the station? She sighs, allowing me to carry on.

"It's healed." I reveal, seeing the semicircle scar with a small indent of skin missing. _How is that possible…?_ At the train station, it was spouting blood. I know I saw it. Anyone would have died from that kind of wound.

"Are you immune?" A younger voice asks, speaking the question on everybody's mind. _Immunity…_ And how grand it sounds! I smirk distantly at the idea of a type of biological defense. Is that a possibility?

"I don't know." She confesses. Ok, I get it. She has no idea what has happened to herself. She knows no more than we do.

"Are you safe to be around?" Takumi presses forwardly. No one gives him a shove to be quiet because they all want to know.

I can't stand to see her isolated like this, "You guys, it's healed." I think that's decent prove not to be afraid of her. "How can that be any threat if it's been there for so long?"

They debate amongst themselves and eventually drop it, seeing my logic. I didn't mean to create chaos and discomfort for her, so I'm happy the topic is gone so fast. The subject changes and Shizuru once again tightens her arms around me in a silent thank you response.

"It's getting dark, we should find a place to stay for tonight." Nao notices.  
>"What about Shinjuku?" Chie thinks out loud, mentally searching for someplace nearby.<br>"No!" I burst in, feeling the need to add whatever knowledge I have, "It's infested there."

"Where then?" They turn to me like I'm the expert. I'm not. I'm just someone who has been stumbling around here blindly with some extra luck.

"What about somewhere here in Shibuya?"  
>"I wouldn't stay in one spot in Shibuya for too long." I warn.<br>"And you've been surviving here on foot, all by yourself, with nothing but the shirt on your back."  
>"You make it sound too impressive." I groan. "I had a bag of stuff," I consider my old bag as useful company, "but dropped it somewhere in Yokohama I think." I try to remember my footsteps around Tokyo and it's sister areas.<p>

"Why come all the way up to Shibuya then?"  
>"Why not?" I smile slyly, but still bitterly.<br>Shibuya is the perfect answer to the question: 'what would you do if you were the last person on the planet (or just in Tokyo)?', and you pretty much have unlimited freedom to do whatever now. I'd go hang out in the most prestigious areas and surround myself with luxury and things I wouldn't be able to do or have if the world was not shattered. That worked out for a few months actually. However, during that time, with Shizuru's disappearance fresh in my mind, how could I enjoy anything? Soon after I landed in middle Tokyo here, everything just started to fall apart completely. To ruins.

"What was in it?" Chie means the bag I mentioned. She sounds interested.  
>"I had a good amount of food, clothes, and survival tools." I recall.<br>"Those would be useful now. We should pick up that bag." I'm surprised by Chie's want to go retrieve my small satchel of household items (it's just shit and some food, really).  
>"We don't have enough gas to get to Yokohama then back to Fuuka." Nao informs.<p>

"We can stay somewhere nearby for the night. Find gas tomorrow and then go get Natsuki's bag." Chie insists, already planning our schedule. "Do you know where you left it, Natsuki?"  
>"About." I suppose. Do they really need my small amount of supplies that badly?<br>"Then we'll swing back up to Fuuka after we get some extra tools."  
>"Let's just find a place to stay for tonight." They force Chie to think in smaller spurts, concentrating on the here and now.<p>

I'm up for it, going with them. _Wherever you guys wana go. Wherever you want to go, Shizuru. _I just want to stay with people. And even though it's to a specific place, it matches my current lifestyle: moving around a lot. That's what I've figured works best. You have to be a shark in these waters, you have to keep moving or you die.

I sigh, letting my thoughts slide now. This is a dream, I'm sure of it, I think as I nestle into Shizuru. My eyes feel heavy. I doubt they would mind if I drifted off, my throat still hurting from my close encounter I was miraculously rescued from. I need sleep. It's been a long time since I've been able to sleep peacefully.

For the first time in months, I drift off to sleep not thinking about Fuuka Station, in her arms.

* * *

><p>"Kanpai!" The room chimes. Glasses clink and then everyone tips their drinks back. The flat sake still manages to burn my throat. I finish my shot and smile, holding it up.<p>

I lean back into Shizuru, sitting on her lap again, as she is propped against the wall of the apartment we're in now.

We have found an apartment complex. Still in Shibuya. We had to go through two others to find a livable one. These apartment buidings are everywhere, but depending on the interior, it can or can't be dangerous to sleep there.

It was cleared out a long time ago and time has stopped here ever since. Toppled furniture sits in its place from running occupants and initial breakout hordes. Broken glass lies untouched on the carpet. And blood is painted in rivers on the walls and floors. Not an atypical living space these days.

We had rummaged through and been able to barricade the doorway. Nao came out of the bedroom a few minutes ago presenting a bottle of sake. The perfect ending to my first day of meeting real people in about half a year, and also good to conclude the meal of (thankfully unopened) import bean cans and other scraps we had found.

And our current entertainment is coming from a bottle of hydrogen peroxide we found in the bathroom we've been playing with. Not everything was taken out of these apartments, especially things not directly related to survival.

Laughter erupts as Reito's twenty minutes is up, and the make-shift plastic wrap is removed from his hair. He had volunteered himself to bleach his ends. Something that used to be really quite trendy for lots of Japanese teens in pre-apocalypse Tokyo. But now, it's more considered a stunt for the people stuck here who truly just need a break. We all give him snickering thumbs-up. He sighs while still smirking, being mock irritated.

I hold my cup out for another glass of sake. Shizuru does the same, and we knock another round back. I exhale strongly, grinning.

Then I continue our previous conversation, absolutely ecstatic about talking to someone besides myself,  
>"Then what did the government do?"<p>

"Nothing. Nobody has heard anything after the evacuations stopped."  
>"Except the rescue parties." This sentence brings us down somewhat. Seeing all too well how great that turned out.<p>

"But the military said that as soon as they realized not everybody could get out on the evacuation routes, and called that white lie back to us from the back of the trains as they zoomed away." Reito makes a hand gesture of a flattened palm and he demonstrates it flying up and away.

"Then those trains did get out?" And fucking ditched us here? Whose dumb-ass plan was this?  
>"You saw the trains, Natsuki. It was like that everywhere." This is a think-for-yourself comeback. I did see those train stations. Totally mobbed. If I had to guess from what it all looked like, I'd say no one really got anywhere.<p>

"And the military was supposed to be controlling these efforts?" I have another complaint I'd very much like to throw in the face of whoever the evac organizer was.  
>"Sure, but that blew up in everybody's faces once there became a bountiful amount of the undead." The others are jokingly acting out the sentences Reito explains to me in a imitation play. Chie and Nao hold their arms out in front of them like the brain-dead zombies. They compel me to smile. Yeah, it can be a joke now, but when you're outside... alone...<p>

"So, the military didn't work. Now we're left facing the rest of dead Japan with… handguns?" I find the closest weapon, which happens to be the handgun Shizuru had laid on the floor next us.

I have to be careful with what comments I use with them that involve any meager humor. If I make it too realistic, they will flinch away. If I use sarcasm, they might react badly. And nobody here wants to hear the straight-up facts anyway.

I turn to Shizuru briefly, fiddling with her firearm, "I thought you didn't like guns." I quip, getting drunker by the minute with everyone else. She smiles sadly. I understand her facial expressions just like the way I remember them.

With no other options in the darkness, we light a fire inside. Burning paper we find and other things that are now useless in this new world.

I am unaware of time after that. I keep taking down sake, feeling happier than I ever imagined I could feel again. _There is nothing better than this_, I reason.

Shizuru dots kisses over my cheeks and along my neck, which is all I let her reach with her being behind me. I can't stop laughing now, taking in how good this is. I giggle and pull away from her, bending downwards. I look over my shoulder; she seems sluggishly confused as to why I've leant forward.

I think we've stopped chatting, but our grins don't decrease in the least.

Shizuru is really acting up now. She's this close to feeling me up in her intoxicated state, with her arms clasped around my waist.

This is later, when I finally give in to my tiredness: deciding it'd be best to sleep now. People underestimate it, but if you don't get enough sleep, that's your worst problem. You won't get far with no sleep. It will hit you worse than the hunger. So I've always tried to make a point to get adequate sleep in a safe place in these horrible times. I get up and announce I'm going to bed in the next room over, and I'll put Shizuru to bed too.

"Don't you mean 'take' her to bed, Natsuki?" Mai messes with me. I sneer and then walk the swaying twenty-one-year-old to the bedroom. I deduce from this experience that I can definitely out-drink Shizuru. Even with the small bottle we found, sake is still a strong drink. I had never gone out drinking with her before we got separated. I lock the door behind us purely out of built-up protective impulse.

This is a bedroom. The thought of the past owner of this bedroom drifts through my head. We are lucky to have found an apartment with a decent bed.  
>"Natsuki…" She murmurs as I lie her head down on the pillow gently. I hover over her in what looks like a compromising position.<p>

"Yes?" I answer, feeling the need to be the more sober one while she's like this. I should be taking care of her; I feel that job is up to me.

She has no verbal response for me, only the kiss she presses up to me. I can't help but melt into it. She is fantastic. Her skin, her eyes, her smile, her voice, her smell, and her arms which wrap around my neck. Every single thing I've missed about her.

I'm pulled onto the bed, which makes me anxious. I break away.

She makes some sort of conscious connection, "We're both legal now, Natsuki," Maybe without alcohol, she might be more discreet about it, but obviously not now. She reaches up to me to bring me back. And I _want_ to be brought back. _I've waited so long to see you again, Shizuru. It's been such a long time. But the fallen pieces of our world are coming back together now, I promise you._

I swiftly crush our mouths together again. I doubt it's what she said that makes me more comfortable with her, but something clicks for me. Something I've missed more anything. With someone I love more than air. I do love you, Shizuru. And I won't leave you ever again. I will not leave you alone.

What then starts as making out quickly escalates.

If someone had told me only a few hours ago that I'd be reunited with the one I love, I wouldn't believe it. How could I? Out of the entire world, she came for me. How can this possibly have happened? Fate?

I wouldn't be able to stand the dead memories of her if this wasn't true.

* * *

><p>Is everyone happy? I'd like to know what you think.<p>

Rereading it, for me, Natsuki seems OOC against her original cold, defensive self. The rarity of a tender moment for Natsuki has become more commonplace because of her situation.  
>I'd like to think this is a correct enough reaction for her.<p>

Tap that 'review' button below to inspire the author and bring around that next chapter faster.


	6. Encounters

**Fallen ~**

I could've kept re-editing this one forever, but I have a feeling you'd like to read what I have so far. Might keep picking at it once it's up.

Thanks again reviewers, you deserve a shoutout! This is your dedicated paragraph. Right here. Love it. And the rest of you: admire it.

**Chapter Six**

**Encounters ~**

Somewhere buried in the back of my mind, I register knocking. Maybe conversation. Your mind is a fragile yet powerful instrument. But your mind in the morning is a stupefied tool. Just a wash of empty senses, which if forced to regain proper function quickly, usually work even worse. I pass these sounds off as nothing much.

With only my instincts operating correctly, I snuggle closer into the body in front of me. It's cold. She's probably cold too. I readjust my arm over her torso to hold her closer. My front and my legs fit so well curled around her back.

It's difficult to ask your brain to restart so quickly and suddenly have to operate at an optimum, not-confused performance. And we are hardly immune to this wake-up fogginess, as the door to our bedroom is smashed open. First is the thick, hollow sound of an object hitting the other side, which is followed by cracking of splintering wood and finally the door smacking the opposite wall with a good amount of force. But it's the distinctive clicks following the door noises that catch my blurry attention.

We both sit up, startled as hell, before we can even comprehend what's happening. We immediately realize our security has been breached. The door is open. It doesn't occur to me that what I hear is the familiar sound of kicking a door in. It doesn't occur to me that a walker doesn't quite posses an ability like that, to break down barriers with that kind of full force. The faces standing there don't quite grab me until the clarity of remembrance seeps in.

Shizuru and I gasp and grab the blanket (that we are lucky enough to have found) to cover us. At this moment, I almost regret going so hard last night, rendering us both exhausted and unable to wake up this morning. Chie and Reito lower their firearms. I don't want them in here, seeing us like this. I feel the need to protect my girl from these idiots. She doesn't need to take this; be embarrassed by them. I'm on the side of the bed nearest the door anyway so I use my body to cover her best I can.

Taking in a panicky-but-trying-to-calm breath through my nose I wish they weren't here to smell the leftover scent of our lovemaking. I know we stink of sweat, blood and dirt, even though I love being back with Shizuru's same distinctive smell, none of us have had a decent shower in months. And not only us, but everybody else too. I also quickly become aware that the bed is still moist where our groins are, from last night.

Chie starts to snicker, then eventually she crumples over with killer laughter, "We heard groaning last night. We weren't sure if it was coming from outside or from your room!" Chie gets out in spaces of breathing from laughter. "Mai! I told you! I so told you!" She screams down the hallway, waving back at us as she exits.

Reito says we should get dressed then also exits, blushing. We don't tell them that they scared us. No, that's too common these days. They don't need to hear it and we don't need to tell them. It's understandable that they had concerns for us after they got no reply from inside our room. We just put up with it and let them leave.

After staring at the closed doorway in upset surprise for another moment after they leave, I turn to her. Even though I'm embarrassed, for some reason she seems worse. Her face is rather flush but she's beautiful. Still sitting quietly, I tilt my head and press a good morning kiss to her lips. She might be a little shell-shocked because she doesn't respond. A little stunned after something like that. Something like having your friends barge in on you the morning after, still naked.

She's no more a romantic than I am, as much as I'd like to think that all the teasing she ever gave me was just that, I know it's all part of a friendly joke that she has a good time seeing me react to. She has never wanted to push me out of my comfort zone; she's only ever made me squirm at her comments. She is shyer than people would believe from her outward personality. There are, however, exceptions when she goes out of her way to do things. Especially for me, I've noticed.

I hug our chests together and I think that wakens her a bit. Last night wasn't our first time. That had been back when we were in school together. When we shared the apartment, a while after the carnival which turned out to be the key turning point in our relationship. We've always stumbled over our own feet when it comes to this sort of thing. Both pretty much clueless as to what we're doing. But it's always been sweet. And last night was better than any other times we've had sex. Last night had been fantastic, so much brighter and emotional than anything we've ever done. I think that my complete isolation from the past half-year has made something like a little kid wanting attention. And that's right, I want nothing more than to be with her now.

"You sleep okay, 'Zuru?" I slur her name knowingly, weaving our fingers together, our hands dried out from what had been fluid last night. I lean into her, nuzzle her lovingly like a cat, all in efforts to comfort her, to be with her. She's clearly thinking about something more than those two walking in on us. Her inattentiveness is going on longer than if she was disturbed by them walking in. I can imagine that she's had some traumatizing experiences that still bother her within the time since everything fell apart. Since _we_ fell apart. I can imagine that there are things she's been through that would cause that 1,000-yard-stare she has on now. I can't think of what exactly. But I trust that it's something that has her still in a good chokehold, and I know better than to ask her what.

I doubt that this is any kind of ill will or ignorance aimed towards me. I wonder if it's something similar to what tore at me for all those months. That _still_ tears at me. That unwillingness to accept reality. This pain you cannot escape. I know this feeling from my own experience… of losing her. I remember how I had to stop myself from thinking about her because of the feelings it brought back. Because of what it did to me when I thought of her. It made life ten times harder to come back to from those thoughts. And I remember how I would take out that anger nearly everyday, beating on walls or walkers. Shizuru had noticed the black tips of my knuckles last night and had asked about it. I've always been a terrible liar and she been had unhappy when she forced me to spit it out, where they came from.

"Yeah," She comes out of it. She seems happy to see me, now that I've brought her out of her thoughts. I get her to smile a little bit, the rarity I've been waiting for. She almost sinks into me, but doesn't quite allow herself to get comfortable. She's on edge now; I can feel it in her muscle's tenseness. I don't think this was ever about Reito and Chie entering.

I can't help, however, but ask her because of the stressed atmosphere she's giving off, "You okay?" I nudge. She inclines her head, interested, just like I remember she would do. Then she smiles gently. She doesn't want me to believe she's having trouble with whatever she's thinking about. She does too much for me.

I know she's never tried to make a connection like the one we've developed with anyone else. Only me. That's not to say that she doesn't like other people. She is naturally a nice, caring, sweet person. But why only me, Shizuru? Why do you care for me so much? She must've seen something in me since the beginning that made her want to get to know me.

I know she loves me. Like more than a friend (and me to her in that way). That's nothing new. She told me lots of times last night. And she wouldn't have done what she did yesterday if not for me. She wouldn't want me so close to her if she didn't love me back. We wouldn't have had a relationship before all this if she hadn't started it. I'm that one soul she's picked to open up to, to devote herself to.

She has always helped me. Always done things for me. Always loved me, taught me how to feel again when I was sure there was no one left, and dragged me along for that ride until I felt the urge to return that love back.

We start all over as she pulls me back down to laying with her, her tongue in my mouth as she seems to have a revived amount of desire and spirit. We're so thirsty and dehydrated, that little bit of salvia we have mingling together feel nice. But sticky when we pull away because of the voice we hear next.

"Guys…?" Our heads jerk up and our mouths away from each other. We scramble for cover again. Chie has barely inched herself just inside the doorway, enough to talk to us, "God, you idiots, put some clothes on. You're both going to catch colds." Chie mumbles, "We have a bit of a situation outside." She continues. _Damn it_ is all I can think.

We let that sentence soak into us for a second. I react stronger than Shizuru, as soon as that registers. "Fuck!" Is the first word to come out of my mouth. I rip away from any embrace we had and punch the futon.

"Umm. If you could meet us in the other room once you're dressed." She informs us, essentially ignoring my outbreak, "And Natsuki, if you could wake Nao up." She directly gives me an order. Then Chie leaves before I can ask her 'why me' specifically. I glance questioningly at Shizuru, wondering why I've been singled out to wake her up.

She only responds with a kiss to my cheek, before getting up and retrieving our clothes, scattered around the broken furniture and dirty floor. I scoot to the end of the bed, thinking. That's not a good enough answer for me.

"What's wrong with Nao?" I ask, rather innocently in retrospect.

"Not a morning person." She dusts off my jeans, unintentionally being her caring self, and tosses them to me. I really should've guessed Nao would be something of a problem for them.

"Why do I have to handle that?" I whine.

We're back. Back to me complaining and Shizuru smiling sweetly and wiping away all the misery I feel. What I haven't had in so long. We're back to this so quickly. It had grown to be so natural for us, that we snap right back to it so easily.

"Cause we've all tried." She slips her arms into the loops of her bra. "Here, get this, please." She turns her back to me, one arm behind her back holding the two strips, for me to buckle the bra straps for her. It's not that she can't, she just wants me to do it, to mess with me. I clasp it together anyway.

"Thank you," She says, instinctively in Kansai dialect, which is very polite. I touch that semi-circle scar she has on her shoulder now. I had touched it last night too and wondered about it. Wondered about how she recovered. But I didn't push her on the subject. It seems to be a sensitive area for her now judging by the conversations we all had in the car yesterday.

Then she throws my shirt at me, urging me to get up. "Go wake her up." She pushes.

I pull my clothes on and hug her again, to never lose her again, not being able to get enough of having her around again. Seeing her alive. It's such a drastic, sudden change. It's insane. But I'm pretty content with this beautiful twist of fate now.

"I'm going to be gone for just a minute, then I'll be right back." I tell her playfully, half joking and half realizing that this is the first time she will leave my sight since they rescued me.

"Oh shutup." She shoves me away, and I feign stumbling back unhappily, but I can't keep my grin from appearing. She snickers at my new antics.

"Go." She waves her arm, also smiling. "Jeez, here I was wanting to find you again, and now I can't get you off me." She turns our separation into a joke.

I give her a smirk and loiter in the middle of the room for an undecided moment, before I rush back up to her for a kiss. She lets this go on for a few lovely seconds. These seconds, these little moments now, and all time our time from last night, I will keep forever embedded in my memories. This will always be special, with her again. Not that our time together ever wasn't. It's just that... having her taken away from me, only to have her materialize back with me. It's too much _not_ to cherish her like crazy now.

Even though I was happy with my height growth during the last half year, I still have to tip my head up slightly to kiss her while standing.

"Ok," An exceptional bewitching smile forms on her lips and I can't help but think she looks amazing. _I'm leaving now, Shizuru_. It seems like such a small thing, but every detail is magnified with her, after thinking she was absolutely dead for so long. To come back from that… it's something else. And it's hard to let that pass, both having her back and leaving the room now. Like a parent sending their child off to school for the first time. Except, she's being sent off to go shoot people outside who're trying to eat us.

"I'll be there in a second," I give her that promise finally and walk out to find wherever it is that Nao has fallen asleep.

* * *

><p>"Nao." Silence.<p>

"Nao. Wake up." The gentle voice prods. And how sweetly it asks. Just like… I can't quite place its familiarity, but it sounds heavenly. It makes me forlorn for reasons I can't process. The voice asks me to wake up, not to 'get up', which is the usual command, which has always sounded far more harsh.

A warm hand holds below my jaw, their wrist cradling my chin before lifting my face upwards. It isn't rough or painful, not pulling as if urgent, just trying to wake me up. If it was painful, I don't think I would have ever noticed because I become all too entranced by having someone hold me at all.

A sudden finger lifts my eyelid and I become aware of a brilliant light with a cringe, though the room is only filled with a dull, curtained morning glow.

"Nao, I said wake up." The gracious words abruptly lose their beauty, as the voice becomes more demanding. "You better be listening." The smooth pad of a thumb softly kneads the bone just above my eye, around the socket, and below my brow where the finger had been holding the lid open but now lets it slowly close again as the figure seems to lose energy in their task. The action soothingly numbs me, making me comfortable and almost able to drift back to sleep.

Exhaustion begins to take over again until I'm shaken out of that reverie. Out of reflex, I jump, my eyes shooting open, surprised and confused.

"Hey," Natsuki reassures, steadying my shoulder once she realizes I'm awake. I have to blink to make sure I know what I'm seeing. I don't feel the same rage I usually do when the others wake me, out of my perfect world. This time, being woken up with her near me, holding me, it's similar to what I dream about so none of that usual anger aroused from being slapped back into this hell-hole springs to my mind.

I'm hit with memories of how we rescued her yesterday, out of a pit of walkers that looked as if no one could ever survive. Looked as if those infected people were gathered around something already dead feast for them. She's extremely lucky we found her in time. And she looks far improved than yesterday. I wonder how she rebounded so fast. Then I'm reminded of her and her girlfriend going off into the next room last night. I might imagine that Natsuki's blonde has something to do with her boomerang health.

But her face, maybe it makes a difference that I'm seeing her smeared with mud and crap, but it looks too foreign to be her. I remember high school Natsuki and she did not look this bitter. She was always cold and alone, but not this lethally uptight. Not like the face she has now. And it's not just in the way she's staring at me, but also in the way she sits on the side of the mattress I've found: defensively. As if I'm a threat.

After being relieved of the immediate surprise of having her suddenly next to me, I settle, leaning back on my elbows. While Natsuki appears hardened, she also seems almost uncomfortable, fidgeting like a little kid, as if waiting for our encounter to be over so she can leave.

"I was told to get you up." There it is. _Get up._ There's no care in that phrase. No feeling. No nothing. It's a command. Supposed to be reserved for lowlifes who have no loved ones. Am I considered just that from their point of view? Am I only in their way?

"What were you dreaming about?" Natsuki asks quietly, glancing up briefly to catch my dumbfounded look. Is she trying to start a conversation? The closed-off expression loosens, if only slightly. "You were smiling." Natsuki continues to tell me, giving off a dampened smile. I still don't respond as I sit silently listen to the older woman as she prolongs the one-sided dialogue. "You were doing that thing again where you barely stick your tongue out." Natsuki demonstrates.

"I was?"

"Yeah. Must've been good." Natsuki jokes, clearly trying to lighten the mood now at a time when a smile or a laugh is rare, but always sorely needed. She concludes her mood swing there, letting any happiness drain from her face, locking herself back away in an obvious, anxious shell again.

I don't reply but also don't shrink away in embarrassment. I find myself unconsciously reaching up to touch my mouth as if my tongue was still sticking out.

As Natsuki rises to leave, done with me, I stop her with a question out of the blue.

"Are we going out today?" "Maybe." "Even on your first day back?" "I'm not _back_ anywhere. This is still fucking no-man's-land." She's really irritated that I called this 'being back'.

"Back with people?" I correct myself. "Maybe." She responds to this, seeing my reasoning.

"Where did you go last night? With Shizuru." I find myself rather ignorantly asking, wanting to know. "What?" The suddenness of my question must have caught Natsuki off guard, so she could only answer with a 'what'.

I repeat.

"I didn't-" "Did you guys… last night? You and Shizuru?" I make it clear what I'm asking.

"Nao we-"

She's stuttering too much. "What happened?" I demand. She doesn't answer that one. "Why are you so defensive?" I accuse her. If I'm trying to pry her out of her armor, it doesn't work. I'm being too harsh. I recognize that mistake before she even opens her mouth to yell back, just as bad as me. I've forced her down to my level.

"Because I've been living alone with the fucking undead for a year!" "Half a year." I correct. I know how long you've been missing, Natsuki. "Same difference!" She's pissed now.

"Why are you the one to wake me up?" I throw another random question at her, " You didn't have to."

Natsuki calms quickly and visibly relaxes on my bedside. I wonder what she's thinking, what brought her down so fast.

She reaches over to me. I don't flinch as Natsuki smoothes my chaotic morning hair affectionately. She even gently plucks out a pine needle (or something) out of my wiry hair that has not been washed out recently.

"Hmmm, Nao…" Natsuki drones and sweeps my bangs out of my eyes and she can't resist meeting my familiar staring green. "Maybe I missed you." Missed me? What kind of bullshit line is that? I frown.

"… I thought you were all dead." Natsuki continues, looking down. I think the effects of the apocalypse are screwing with her emotions and how she's being bipolar.

And how badly I want to believe that Natsuki missed me. How badly I want to trust that little nagging thought at the back of my head saying that I do want to be missed by others. But I can't accept it. I can't let that kind of virus into my head. That kind that other people close to you cause. That lovesick feeling. I can't afford that, when I have to be able to function on my own.

In no words will any further expression from me come. I sit frozen, bullied by the argument in my thoughts. And while I'm zoned out like this, I feel a timid pressure on my cheek. I numbly turn to face Natsuki. _A kiss? _What the hell, Natsuki?

"It's nice to see you again, Nao," She tells me courteously. I let her leave after that, not feeling the urge to push her anymore, not to be mixed up and confused anymore. But not before learning that I'm wanted in the other room sometime soon.

As soon as the older girl turns the corner, I wipe my cheek with the back of my hand furiously.

* * *

><p>I listen to the voices I know, coming from behind one of the apartment doors down the hall. Nothing sounds stressed, so I can imagine the room is safe. Having lived alone in these kinds of dangerous situations for so long puts you pretty permanently on edge. Save for those few intimate encounters over the last couple hours, when I could care about nothing else more than her.<p>

I'm cautious because I think I've forgotten how to live otherwise. I push the door open a crack. It catches their attentions.

"Natsuki," Shizuru calls me, her tone also supposed to reassure me that the room is not dangerous and fine for me to enter. I wander in meekly and slide in next to her, sitting on the same shelf as she is.

She kisses me, which I don't expect in a room of our friends, "There's a lot of them outside." She explains quietly, resting her forehead on mine.

_Ohh, _I get it now. We're in a tight spot. I'm being debriefed with what they were just talking about and apparently that's worth a kiss. I think she maybe feels bad that I've been dragged in here along with them, that's what the I'm-sorry-kiss was for. I don't blame you. How could I? I'm happy to be here.

"They might've followed us here," She continues in a reluctant whisper, staying close to me. Or maybe she's afraid. Nobody wants to face _a lot of them._ It's a traumatizing experience. It's something like cutting down trees to get out of the forest you've gotten lost in, except they're more than trees. They're people.

Maybe they're unsure of what to do, how to deal with this extreme threat in an unknown environment.

Her eyes are closed and she's gently letting her head loll while leaning on me. Ok, yeah, I think I tired her out. But I think part of it is she doesn't want to see. All the chaos and violence of 'new' Tokyo. It's never been like her to want to cause random bloodshed. However, if she has a reason to fight for, that changes things. I remember being firsthand witness to what she can do with a purpose. But living in this hell, it's not in her personality to want to be a destructive killer every day like we all have to be now, even though she has killed before.

She takes in a deep breath and lifts off of me in reawakened disappointment. Like how I used to do when I actually attended classes at Fuuka. She nods at me, flicking her chin to a boarded window across the room. I catch her drift, but if the view makes her like this, I doubt I will want to see either.

She doesn't make further eye contact as I watch her stare at the floor. I see that same eating feeling I'm used to, briefly shine inside of her. That guilt. Does she actually feel that she's done something wrong? Or am I interrupting her mood wrong? It could just be she feels a bit hopeless.

I try the others in the room. They don't give me any expressions. They all seemed to have already talked about this subject without me. I slip off my seat on the shelf and carefully walk over to a slit in the plywood boarding.

If I didn't know better, I'd think it's a joke. That it's fake. That I'm dreaming. That it's make-up on them; fake blood, I'm sure. Real blood doesn't drizzle out of people's limbs and injuries like that. But none of that is true and I know it. There has become a large gap of recent between what is real and what I want to believe. And it's agonizing to have to jump back and forth over that gap.

A main artery roadway of Shibuya is clogged to the brim with a mass of ill, staggering people. I rip myself away from the window. I don't want to see anymore. None of it. _Screw this all to hell!_ Why are we all trying so damn hard? For what?

I let myself fall, both mentally and physically to the ground, leaning on the wall next to the window. This position is oh too familiar.

I know who I used to be. Stronger. Much stronger. Much more able. More able to live alone. Much more willing to live alone with no one else to care about or deal with. That was until, first off, Shizuru tried to pry into my life, and secondly, until people started to attack other people. Cannibalistically. Not as in war. Completely different than that. It's not a war. It never was. It's an extermination.

Shizuru comes over and sits cross-legged with me. She doesn't make an attempt to hold me. She recognizes that I'm too upset to want sympathetic comfort. Someone close by is just enough for now.

Reito pulls back a curtain on another window and peers outside, "They're all over the car," He notes, not trying to trouble anyone further, just making observations. His new blonde ends make him look less serious. "We aren't getting out of here anytime soon." He says sadly. He must feel this crushing, fuck-it-all feeling too. I suppose all of us do.

But in a marvelous, sudden demonstration, as if god himself wanted to contradict Reito, the second after Reito says that, we hear a thundering explosion that shakes us all to our knees.

"What the hell?" Someone screams. That's how instantly disorientated I am: enough to not be able to distinguish either a man's yell or a woman's.

"What was that?" Shizuru has found my hand. Rather quickly, maybe being less phased from the abrupt commotion than me. But being able to be more on top and things and less confused doesn't make her any less scared. She has a solid grip with my hand. I'd almost say it kind of hurts and I'd rather shake it off. But I would never push her away, I won't lose her again, especially not in a time like this.

"An earthquake?" Japan gets lots of those. Most all of Tokyo skyscrapers are specifically built to withstand intense earthquakes because we get so many. But that didn't feel, or sound, like a tremor of pieces of earth moving. It was more controlled.

I struggle to unclip my firearm, which I had instinctively tucked into my pants earlier without me even noticing. I pull the hammer back and hold it up against the open doorway, expecting the worst to come charging in. But it hits me: I'm still empty.

Chie is up at the window after our immediate surprise (and the shaking) wears off. "Holy shit," She brings her arm up over her mouth and stumbles away from the pane, coughing disgustedly. I need to know what happened. I need to know what is out there.

I lurch to my feet and give a glance to Shizuru, telling her 'it's okay' through a look. I see red recognize my green in understanding. She drops my hand.

I feel myself almost lose myself, in an out-of-body way. There is an ugly maroon carpeting the street now. More gore than anyone should ever have to experience. It reeks of death, smoldering and rancid flesh; a smell I don't want to have to be anywhere near.

I suppress vomit in my throat. There are limbs, burning limbs, in still standing telephone posts, on streetlights, and in trees. Heads, in this context, also being considered as limbs. People's, what used to be, appendages are completely separate from wherever their body (if they had not been blown into oblivion) has landed. Our view from this building is too far away from the exact hit spot to have any horrific pieces on the windows.

Aside from the sickening view of the carnage, what amazes me is the open space in the mob of people that explosion has created. A nice circle of clearing.

Then I zone back into the room, becoming more aware of everyone standing around me, also wanting to see outside. Shizuru appears at my right side and I want to push her back into the room, where there are no windows to this shit. But I don't.

And I was right, she's doesn't want to see this, she hates it and it frightens her, "Natsuki." She buries her head in my neck. I am quick to hold her back, while still dazedly staring at the wreckage of bodies.

Nao runs into the room, babbling questions and then frozen fearfully to her spot, also unsure of what to do next or where to go. I think I see Mai goes over to her; I have my own girl to take care of.

Before anybody can get another word out there is another. Another explosion. Unexpectedly and just as the last time, we are thrown to the floor. I want to cover my own head before we're cast to the wooden floor, but thinking fast, I encircle my arms around Shizuru, making sure she's not hurt by the fall. I feel her shaking. I feel myself shaking, as if on an overdose of drugs. I can't hold my palm still. I test it after the second quaking ends and I'm quivering like a leaf in a strong breeze.

Whatever's happening, whoever's doing this, they're using powerful machinery. That's the first time I think of _others_ creating these explosions. Is it others with frags? Mines? No… bigger than that. Is it the military?

I remember that American incident from a number of years ago where two skyscrapers collapsed. I can only imagine this is what the people inside those buildings felt like.

Shizuru is constricting me, arms around my neck tightly. Eyes squeezed shut, eyebrows curved in concern, deeply huddled into the dazed embrace I'm returning. I can't do anymore for her, so I tell her what I can. I lie to her, "It's okay. We're alright." I feel her hiccup nervously from holding her back. I notice that Takumi is also clinging to Mai and Nao to Chie.

We think we're going to die. This might be it. But then again, for a while now, every day seems like it's the end of the tunnel approaching.

There's something I need to see. I drag myself, with Shizuru, over to the view out of the long, newly shattered glass frame.

This new blast clearing is a step _closer_ to our building. A step closer to our car outside. I notice this right off the bat after having noticed the amount of clearing for the last blast.

Then, a new sound. I hear it before I notice what it is. A smack and smashing of bricks below us. Very fast and efficient. Not an explosion, not bullets. It hits a low part of our building, seeming to punch into the brickwork and stay there. It's after I put that much together then I notice a wire that extends from the part of our building that was just now hit, to a different, higher floor of another building across the street. This wire stretches over the remaining mob of walkers. They're just as confused as we are, unsure of where to attack, yet understanding that something is going on.

Reito's large figure approaches from behind me. I have the nervous urge to glimpse at him for safety's sake. He places a hand on my shoulder to steady himself. I don't mind. We're all shaken. Shizuru doesn't look up, fully entrusting me. I hope she's not crying, I can't tell. I don't want her to cry. I don't want to see her in such defeated misery like this.

Something moving fast catches my eye. Something on the wire. I have to squint; the thing is actually attached to the cord.

"Do you see that?" He points, Reito has noticed this anomaly too. It gets closer, zipping down the line on it's own. It's bag. A regular duffle bag. But this duffle getting so close to our building, it makes me worried. It reminds me of what they used to do with suspicious packages at airports. Security used to get rid of them or even blow them up because who knows what's inside of them. Who knows what's inside this bag heading straight at us…

I would've thought on this longer but new shapes emerge from the mouth of where the wire connects to the other tower. It's hard to see but it becomes obvious soon enough, two people are zooming down the line. It's a zip-line. It was a grappling hook they shot into the structure of this building. And that bag is their supplies. It all pieces together.

Shizuru has her head up now, doing a little better with her uneasiness. I look at her, letting myself be distracted because of her for a moment. The way I'm holding her is like a little puppy, "You okay?" I ask her for the second time this hour. It's really a stupid question, but it's the first thing I think of for the sake of talking to her and keeping her calm and collected. She makes some motion similar enough to a nod. I rub her back softly. I wonder if she would still be in this weak state if I weren't here to protect her.

The sound like a zipper makes me yank my head up. Reito stares too. Two men swing down the long zip-line above the crowds of man-eaters.

I somehow still have my wits about me that cause me to decide what to do next, to get up, "We have to get downstairs!" I help Shizuru up caringly, taking that extra second just for her.

I have the group's attention and somehow they're ready to go. They run with me down the nearby staircase we find, willing to go along with me. We hear gunfire break out somewhere outside, muffled by the walls. I can guess it's none other than our buddies from the zip-line.

We find the apartment lobby and race to the front door. Our car is still parked just outside there, beat up from the bunch of walkers.

I don't know how much 'stunning' we can all take in one setting. These two figures have cleared out an entire area around our car, next to this building's entrance. Gunshot after loud gunshot, they drop the wobbling, dead people so easily, as if they've been doing this forever. I'm astounded at their performance, but I'm even more overwhelming with happiness. More people!

We barge through the front doors to greet them. But abruptly, it's all too good to be true. We step outside and they are acutely aware that we are not walkers and for some reason that appears to make us more of a threat. The guns are aimed at us.

"Whoa, whoa." We put our arms up. We can't very well draw our own guns at gunpoint. I know how being on the other end of a muzzle feels. Only on rare occasion have I ever found myself on the receiving end of this action. We all feel that same sinking, stopped-dead feeling for a moment, being scared and unsure.

Their reasoning is then made incredibly clear, "We're taking the car." So clear it hurts. They say is proudly and surely, just like how they expressed their explosions. Arrogant with their power. That power only coming from the weapons they possess.

"What? Why?" Takumi protests. Taking their aim down from us, seeing as no kind of danger. They only scoff at the kid and start to rummage around the car. Our car.

"We could work together." Reito quickly provides a more logical suggestion. They seem too busy to be listening to us.

"Dude, it's broken," Chie shrugs, warning the man who gets into the driver's seat while they other lifts up the hood and starts to fiddle inside of it.

"Hey!" Reito steps forward and grabs the man's shirt who is closest, "Don't touch it." The guy shrugs him off.

"Asshole," Reito addresses him, "I said don't touch it." The man has a bigger build than Reito and the guy suddenly and easily slugs him down. Mai rushes to his side. She helps Reito sit up as he wipes his fist over his bleeding mouth. Now we're all pissed. All involved.

"Get out of my car!" Nao marches over to the man in the driver's seat.

Chie and I tromp right up to the guy at the hood and shove him backwards. _I'm not taking this._

"I'm not dealing with a bunch of little kids. Piss off." To be honest, I kind of understand his thinking. His cold, single-minded thinking. Lots of people do bog each other down. It's difficult to move around with a group. To _escape. _To _survive._Especially, like he said, the younger people who need care and attention, not that I consider myself 'young' anymore or any kind of dead weight. Not after all this. I know what I'm doing better than anyone. Even though I've had a hard time, it's not like I haven't gained skills from my experience. He takes a bulky, absentminded swing at us, like swatting flies, but we aren't touched by this, stepping backwards from him.

Shizuru takes up a smart position as an overall guard, shooting at more oncoming walkers with the handgun she pulls from her pants. The noise is irrelevant now that so much has been made.

The one in the car pulls his gun on Nao. She can't get close to that. And we can't get close to the guy at the hood. That's when Reito decides he's had enough of these idiots messing with us, of putting us all in danger.

"No!" He swings a blackened AK out from around his shoulder. I honestly had not noticed he had been carrying that. Jesus, a big heavy military weapon like that, why haven't we been plowing through all these crowds? It had been strung around his back. That's enough excuse for my frazzled self to not take note of the hidden weapon. There's plenty of half-eaten service-men lying around for us to snag a few extra rounds. _Good score._

"Fuck no!" He continues and lets loose a quick spray of bullets in a line at their feet. A warning. I can see that he's angry enough and out-of-it enough that he'll go further than that if they don't back down.

"Reito." We don't need him to kill them. If they won't work with us, we only need shoo them away from our stuff. We don't need more dead. He wrenches the assault rifle up to eye-level against his cheek.

"Let go of her!" He screams, his voice almost cracking from rage. He nods his head to his left without looking there. Another thing I hadn't noticed. The man in the car has gotten ahold of Nao's wrist and he immediately releases her. They have guns too, but they can't move them to fire while being held at Reito's gunpoint.

Nao rushes away back to us as fast as she can without tripping. Reito grabs her arm as a safety net once she's near the rest of us and drags her behind him, roughly yet affectionately as you would deal with someone you are concerned for. He effectively becomes our shield.

"Get out!" He booms next, his voice not sounding like him. It's far too stressed to be him. I think the men try to mutter an agreement with us, a funny thing for them to be doing with their arms up. But something about this situation has Reito more on the bloody edge than I've ever seen him, and them not complying to him tips him over. "Now!" He fires a shot into the man's foot at the hood.

Instantaneously, the man is jumping about, shrieking and grasping his burst foot. Reito snaps to his left where the man in the car still sits. It would've been a good chance for him to fight back, to line up the handgun he's holding while Reito looked away. But I can see in his face, he's scared shitless. Reito's too fast to let the man try anything. I can hear Reito's snorted breathing through his nose. I don't think anyone can get in his way now.

"You wouldn't." The man is trying to maintain a grin, thinking he's safe.

"I would!" Reito shakes the action rifle in fury, his face still glued to the side: aiming precisely. He's fuming and his eyes are glazed over with a familiar glassy, red stare. He rattles the AK again, half for emphasis, half because he can no longer control himself, the parts of metal on the machine clattering threateningly.

Shizuru's bullets briefly interrupt the deadlock because she has to fire at the oncoming people.

"You've never actually killed anyone. Only these shadows. These ghosts here. They're not real people anymore." The man elaborates, "You can't-" A few shots ring out from where Reito is standing. He pulled the trigger back for more than a second, which spits out a stream of fire. I can see his breathing as his back moves with each heaved breath. This isn't the same world anymore.

"I can!" Reito continues to screams at the dead body in Nao's car. Thinking the tiniest bit clearly, he reaches in and tries the ignition. It's shot. Somehow completely dismantled. We all think the same sad, angry thing.

This is when I come out of my bystander fog. Something inside me also shatters. Something in my thoughts clicks and my emotions seem to unexpectedly erupt. I start shouting, first purely swearing at them. Doing them same thing as Reito, I yell at the one dead man in the driver's seat, then direct myself to the squirming guy on the ground in front of the car. I plant a deep kick into his stomach, "What the hell?!" It's really just that one repeated thought that is absolutely ripping out of my throat, "What the hell?!"

I hear a 'Natsuki' off in the distance somewhere, but I'm too caught up in my sudden fit to pay attention to the others.

I think of something new, why I'm really so angry, "I've been here!" There it is. "I've been here!"

I think it's something about them being non-zombies that makes both of us so completely and irrationally upset with these guys. What makes us lose it. We all really need to be working together in this crazy time, but instead they come into our lives, put us in danger, want to take our things. But most importantly, they want to ditch us here. Not help. Not help at all!

"I've been here!" I've been living here alone too! I was and _am_ still here! _I have been here!_ If they've been hanging out around Shibuya, same as me for all this time, where have they been? Why hadn't they come to my rescue earlier? I rip out my handgun and click the empty thing over and over again. Nothing happens while I scream for it to work. I then throw it to the ground, after fifty-something tries of firing, I eventually figure it useless. No one tries to stop me.

"What's wrong with you!" I resort back to physical aggression, nailing him again and again the stomach until he's puking blood, "I've been here too!" It's the only thing I can say. Then, I'm grabbed from behind and I frantically thrash to break free, but Shizuru has a tight grip on me, locking my arms behind my back.

"Okay," She exhales, "Okay."

I keep shouting as the group turns and walks disappointedly back inside, Shizuru dragging me, my heels actually digging into and kicking in the gravel.

And here we are, back inside. I keep shouting, calling him names, until the lobby doors are closed. Then I let myself go limp in my baby's arms. I trust her. Giving up, slumping, I put my full weight on her because I feel like shit now. She lowers me to the ground but doesn't sit with me. This is only to give us a break. A break I desperately need. I thankfully lean back against her legs. She stays planted there just so I can do this. She's on her guard now, looking around, not really having been too affected by the temper tantrums Reito and I were tainted with.

"Did they follow us here from last night?" Takumi is just bubbling with questions.

"Maybe," Chie answers quickly, pretty much to shut the little boy up because no wants to think about it. She's wearing with a severely serious face.

I'm uselessly tired now, I think, taking in the glorious lull in the action. I close my eyes briefly only to reopen them out of curiosity and fear. I'm still feeling bouncy from that encounter but am lacking the energy to express this jittery sensation. I squirm unsettled against Shizuru's legs. She reaches down and rubs my head; my hair rather greasy from not washing it. Without anything being spoken or communicated: she understands all the reasoning for my split personality, and gives me a good amount of affection. I let myself cool off and purr at her touch.

I scan around the room at the exhausted lot of all of us, glancing at the approaching figures from behind the glass outside. It's difficult to remain calm when they're close by, but it seems much more manageable with other live people nearby. The two men are out of sight now, blocked by the crowd. I could care less about them even though I had high hopes for them.

Mai is sitting with our two boys, talking to Reito inaudibly. Chie is near Nao and we're here. What an odd lot we are. Honestly. Back in high school, I never would have believed any of this. But what a long time ago that was. And between now and then, what a fucked up place the world has become.

I put an arm up to ask for Shizuru's hand. She drops a fatigued hand onto mine. With her hand in mine, I revel in the feel of kneading her palm. Tipping my head up, eyes closed in the way one would bask in the sun. I bask in her glow. My dear fallen angel. My sweet Shizuru. I pull her hand down to my face-level and give it a chivalrous kiss.

_I'm not going to let go, Shi_. That almost sounds like a teasing remark, but I mean it. Some while ago, you sucked me into loving you to the ends of the earth and now, I can't let go of that and I never will.

I'm kinda too worn-out to do shit about it now, but you're my world Ru.

I feel my stomach churn, disrupting my mental love poem, and I note that I'm hungry again.

* * *

><p>Was it up to par? Reviewing is good karma.<p>

Be patient for next chapters. School is about to wedge itself in the way of everything for me.


	7. Dominos

**Fallen ~**

I'll try to update soon. Hang in there guys. I promise you, this is an ongoing project.

**Chapter Seven**

**Dominos ~**

I exhale.

I unzip my jacket, taking my snow-covered hood down. I flutter a hand through my hair, then flick it to the side out of habit.

I take another deep breath and readjust the bouquet I'm holding. This idea makes me anxious. It's not really in my personality to go out of my way to do things for other people, let alone do anything romantic… like flowers.

I finally put the key into my own apartment door, having enough courage to cross the threshold.

"Natsuki?" My name is called because she must've heard me enter. We have one of the larger, upperclassmen multi-room apartments that are available nearly off-campus as dorms. She emerges from the bedroom, drying her hair with a towel, and wearing the most striking, petite, black dress.

I'm captivated by her appearance. I didn't know she'd being wearing such a number, "H-hi." I let out a breathy idiotic greeting, having hesitated too long between pronouncing the letters, making it sound like a little kid stuttering. She takes note of my reaction and smirks, purposely turning on a heel, leaving me, heading back towards the bathroom.

An interested, and easily distracted part of me leans to follow her into the bathroom without moving my feet, but I end up looking away fast. I'm suddenly self-conscious. Only Shizuru can ever do this to me; make me care like this. I'm in jeans, a T-shirt, and a coat. Horrible comparison. I don't even come close to her lovely, sleek outfit.

"What does Natsuki have?" She speaks from the bathroom, specifically in third person because she's in a good mood. It would've sounded too serious for her if she had directly asked me in first person.

I cross through the apartment bedroom to the bathroom to confront her with what I have. She gives me something of a glance, smiling that she's drawn me to her, then continues to fix her hair in the mirror.

I gather up all of the strength I have and give her an abrupt kiss on the cheek. I think that was unexpected for her. So she stops and turns to me, recognizing that I want her attention.

"Happy birthday," Even though I've been telling her that same phrase since we woke up, she deserves to hear it again as I present with her the flowers I had been holding childishly behind my back.

Her eyes are wide, marveling at the selection of the bunch and the colors of them, "You didn't need to…" She obviously saw this coming, having seen me walk in, but having me give them to her is a different story and feeling. She knows I'm not bold with any kind of relationships, so my behavior now is something to her. I'm trying my best to make it special.

More excitedly, I also pull out another small wrapped gift out of my coat pocket. Unlike the flowers, which I just ran out and got now, this is a present I've had for a while. She's watching with surprised curiosity.

It is noticeably not well wrapped, and one can clearly see the rounded top of this item through its paper, but she doesn't care. She wouldn't care if I gave her nothing at all. She'd still be happy. And I don't know how she does it.

She cradles the flowers in the elbow of one arm and accepts my next birthday present gratefully with the other. Her face is mesh of happiness and it makes me light up to see her in such good spirits.

Carefully, the wrapping paper comes off and I have that anxious waiting-for-a-reaction feeling, which I had rarely ever encountered before Shizuru. Mai has given me hell before for how I act around Shizuru now. She thinks I've gotten soft because of and living with Shizuru. That she's made me warmer. Broken through my wariness of being with others and gained enough of my trust for me to live with her; to let her close to me, and to love her back.

She holds the snowglobe up to the light. Then shakes it to swirl the snowflakes around inside the sphere. I can only hope that giving her 'snow' as a present in December isn't a stupid move. She looks to me. Then I'm kissed. Of course, I kiss her back.

"Thank you," She tells me with joyful wet eyes. I'm pleased that she is content with her gifts from what my small budget allowed.

But I don't let the mushy moment last for long, "You can't wear that." I grin.

"Oh?" She also catches my drift and smirks while twirling back to the mirror. Twirling is an actuate description because she intentionally spins to make the ends of the dress luff out.

"Too cold." I shake my head and cross my arms, leaning back on the doorframe, watching her.

"Then we could stay here," She finishes up and hugs me. I almost flinch out of it because this idea worries me for a split second. I whip my head to face her, "No! I made these reservations weeks ago!" I know my face must drop because she's laughing, while still trying to hold me as I get stormy. She has won yet again.

"At least wear tights or something," I say quietly, genuinely caring, walking irately out of her grasp. But I can hardly ever stay mad at her for these teasing things.

"I am." She says, putting her arms out, proving how she is already wearing skin-colored tights I hadn't noticed. I must have been so absorbed in her figure and the gift giving.

I don't want her to be freezing all through our date…

"And a coat." I add importantly, still trying to win the game I've already lost. She walks over to retrieve her majestic winter coat that matches her black dress.

Then, as I'm still getting ready, grabbing the keys, she places the snowglobe on the shelf in the living room. The kanji inside it illuminating the whole room. 'Forever.'

I'm sitting numbly. Back to back with Kanzaki. And he's just as tired as me. We are literally letting our mouths hang open as we stare off into space.

I don't have a weapon anymore, but Reito still has his machine gun. Everyone else is outside. I look out the glass doors to watch Mai on Chie's shoulders, and Takumi on top of hers in a three-person stack, reaching up to take the men's leftover bag from the zip line wire. Nao and Shizuru are also outside with them as lookouts.

The wire is higher up than it first appeared. At least three people high apparently. I wonder why the men left their bag there. Were they going to grab it after they got our car working? I can't really imagine what their plan was.

We had to wait an hour or two for the walkers to disperse out front. And they did. They are persistent beasts, but generally move on from things when they lose a trail or are not having any luck at one particular place for a long time. It is a terrifying fact that they still have enough broken brainpower to decide that walking into a wall for a while isn't working.

We shot the rest of them once we got fed up with hanging around for hours and we will be out of here soon once again because of the noise we've made. Keep moving to keep breathing.

I'm remembering the dialogue and picturing the places we went on her twenty-first birthday. It's going to be her twenty-second in something close to a month or so now. I can't remember the last time I've seen an accurate calendar.  
>Memories are something like TV now. And it doesn't hurt as much to think about them now that she's with me again.<p>

We went out to dinner after we left the apartment. I never rode my bike in the winter months, so we took her car. Then we had walked around in the falling snow for a bit after dinner. We went through a small city-park. It wasn't really dark at that late hour we were out because of all the Christmas lights lit up everywhere. It was a nice warming feeling that only being with Shizuru could ever bring out in me. I held her hand, not minding anyone that went by. Not on her birthday. Then we came home and went to bed together. That was the whole reason we moved in together. To have more time with each other, but mostly to share a bed.

For amusement, I think on to how that night continued. It was me who got the lot of it on _her _birthday. I remember how she was fine with that and had me pinned for a couple of sweet hours before I insisted that she get something for her birthday. Then for some reason, we felt the need to overdo it, so we ended up staying up as late as we could handle watching popular Christmas movies from overseas (the ones that were in English, knowing the language better than me on account of her actually attending classes, she would whisper translations to me) after we deemed ourselves too tired to move.

I look up and they're coming back inside now. Nao tosses the bag on the ground in front of everybody. It's a used sports bag, and it's contents clatter, which excites us. They have yet to open it though. I inch forward to it because it's right in front of me and unzip it. The rest of them look on anxiously.

Guns. Firepower. Rifles. I wonder where in the hell these guys got this stuff after everything was raided, then used up, then strewn all over the place. It's been difficult of recent to even come across a nice baseball bat.

"Hah!" I laugh, picking out a heavy pistol I'm familiar with. Everyone pieces through it, reloading and finding new arms. I feel crazy. Like... literally a crazy person; someone about to go on a rampage through a populated city. This is never something I would've ever dreamed I'd be doing.

I grab what I need then I stand up and move next to Shi. I don't have anything to say to her. I just want to be near her. Her presence is still charming as ever… even with a weapon in her hands.

She is reloading her semi-automatic. She finds the 9mm bullets clip from the bag easily. I never taught her to do that, although I could've, and now I feel bad that I didn't. She must've had to learn how to deal with firearms on her own. I was always careful to keep guns away from her in the apartment because I knew she didn't like them. I didn't think she'd ever need this kind of knowledge and I wasn't willing to corrupt her with it back then. She was fine with her melee weapon in the carnival, then that was over and that was that. But now, I feel awful I left her alone with no firearm experience. It makes me feel terrible that I knew what I was doing with my gun for those six months. I watch her click the safety on the store it back in her pants pocket.

"Let's go," Chie says once we've gotten what we want from the bag. Reito had already solemnly gotten up and has been looking for a back door. We don't want to go out front again where activity is still lightly buzzing. He's gotten through to a parking garage area. We all follow behind him. This is street level so we amble out of the driveway.

It's gloomy out, like I would expect for fall turning winter. It's cold. I naively reach for Shizuru's hand. She willingly intertwines our fingers together and gives me an extra, affectionate squeeze. We aren't wearing gloves like we were on Shizuru's birthday (not that it's December already, I know). We don't have that luxury. So I'm aware of how cold her hand that I'm holding is. We haven't been inside a decently heated place since summer and we've had no breaks from this madness or nice beds to rest in. I attempt to keep her hand warm, bringing both my hands to enclose hers. She appreciates this, responding by laying her head on my shoulder.

I'm not sure if I would allow myself to be this demonstrative with our relationship if it were not the end of the world. But nonetheless, I like it now because it is, in fact, the end of the world. I like having her with me. I wouldn't want it any other way. We stroll slowly behind everyone else, being able to afford having a lax moment in our perilous journey. There are not enough of these times now, with not many walkers around, out here behind the building. So we are content that we can walk leisurely. We stride leisurely, hand in hand, through this vision of hell.

I watch the clouds above us through the broken building skyline. The carefree clouds that haven't been changed by this apocalypse. They are the same as ever. Just like how I've seen them all my life. Just like how Shi and I would have seen them any other day.  
>I'm overcome with the emotional urge to be as near to her as possible. I start with a kiss to her brow, then nudge her head still on my shoulder to give her a proper kiss.<br>She does so well with understanding my thoughts. She always has, as she does now, adding a reassuring edge to the way we kiss and support each other.

We break then, understanding the facts: that we're close to each other, and how together everything seems that much brighter together, but also the unforgiving relentless reminder of where we are and how much we can do to remedy that. I sigh and my gaze is back up at the clouds. There are many and they have gotten dark, as if a blanket has been pulled across the heavens. I feel a more apprehensive feeling rouse in me. That's not uncommon now, however this time feels specific, something uneasy. Not something I can place though, leaving me just as blind as ever in this maze of a future.

It is soon enough that we are met with our first obstacle.

A canal. Water. Of course, this is not drinking water. And it's really quite difficult to have to look at. I'm so thirsty. And hungry… my stomach aches; I'm forced to pay more attention to this growing pain as it gurgles within me.

It's a tight river channel, cutting directly through this part of Tokyo in a long line. It is hidden by rows of lower skyscrapers, which are adorned with ugly exterior ornaments: pipes and stairs and burnt debris. I wonder if we've reached a lower-class area.

Maybe this waterway was made for passage of small boats in locks, or possibly hydropower, or even sewage treatment. I'm not sure. But whatever it was originally intended for, it's not that anymore.

It appears unrestrained, with a flooded tide, obviously drawing a large amount of seawater in from wherever it's mouth is, we can tell by the smell. It confused us before we rounded the previous block to see this river. We thought we had reached the coast already by the salty smell carried through the air. It has a strong current to show that it's from the ocean. Flowing very fast, it's choppy: the waves being cut up systematically by the jutting cement edges on the sides. This is what makes me think it was some type of engineered power provider or a lock system: the way the waves are controlled by these protruding block edges. Slamming and white-capping against the sides, the waves are being stirred in each section in an overlapping way, looking like how cogs in a clock fit together.

It's also loud with these waves crashing. This blockage stops us from proceeding in our general southern direction.

We're all rather dumbfounded, standing and staring, wondering where to go from here. It isn't until somebody comes out of this tired trance and notices the crowd that's been lagging behind us.

"We need to go," Nao says urgently. She tugs on my sleeve because I happen to be closest to her. I pull Shizuru along with me because she won't look away from the lopsided people trailing us. I hold her hand tighter.

Faster and faster, we start building speed to a jog. There are a growing number of crawlers we notice, looming in the in-between spaces of buildings. It's surprising each time, like you open the door and the monster is actually standing right in front of you. When they see us go by, they join into the gang behind us. It's a cycle. They keep getting drawn to us, seemingly knowing our constant location, even though we're making no more noise than breathing and footsteps.

I don't know what's causing this; it wasn't this bad before…

It must be something close to a full kilometer now. How far we've been running. We've jumped to running now. I don't think the walkers are speeding up at all, there's just more of them. Which is practically just as bad as if they were speeding up. I don't let go of Shizuru's hand. I can't. I'm too nervous.

This is killing me. The running. In my damaged, malnourished state I feel like my stomach is gnawing on itself. The running is nonstop. How could we stop? Stopping and fighting would be stupid.

I can't get enough air in, and my throat starts to close like a tunnel. I hear my panting ringing in my ears. But most significantly, the buring pain beneath my ribs is rising.

Slowly, when not interrupted by the insistent thought of 'when will this pain be over?', I recognize this stomach pain now as the same from yesterday. Yesterday morning when I was still alone. _What a long time ago that already seems_, I muse.

This tight sharp pain is getting far worse, consuming my whole attention. Something has been stirred inside of me, something broken. Something has gone horribly wrong. This isn't normal hunger pain anymore.

I stop being the one to pull Shizuru along and she starts to have to yank on _my_ arm. This causes her to give me a checking glance, seeing if I need anything. I'm able to see her face then too. Her eyes are rimmed with tears and I wish I could do something, anything, to make them go away. I wish I could make this stop.

That's when she notices something about my physical appearance, "Natsuki? What's wrong?" She uses a concerned tone I don't want to hear my name attached to. I don't know what she's talking about. She slows to an easier pace and all I can think is 'why'. I need to stop, but how did she know and what could she do about it?  
>Her question catches everyone else's attentions. She must've seen something specific on me to have said that and I'm not sure what.<p>

"What's on your mouth?" She asks, as we're still moving. I put my free hand to my mouth. I feel some sort of substance over my lower lip and chin. Runny, slick liquid. Water? Spit? No… I move my fingers away to look at them. Red.

"I don't…" I can barely speak, my voice a rasp from breathing so hard. We've slowed considerably, the others kind of dancing with us, afraid to slow down too much.

Then Chie saves us, "A bridge," She points. We all sigh. A nice, stone pedestrian walkway that appears traditional while still utilitarian Japanese use is in front of us now. It has a new-looking metal railing stretching up then down on either side that clearly doesn't match the elegance or color, appearing to be there only to enforce protection from the crashing waves below.

This seems like the one thing we've been running to and waiting for. We all seem have the collective thought that if we cross over this, we'll be safe. We should've thought over crossing because that's only partially true. And then even less true once we actually get on the bridge.

We had sped up a little bit to reach this landmark. But once we're halfway across, we have to stop. We have the zeds on the other side's attention now too. And smartly enough, they too realize they have to cross over this bridge to get to us.

I need to breath. I crumple over my knees and hold my stomach. It's a periodic stabbing pain in my ribcage now. Growing and dropping every few seconds. Terrible. The running seems to have started this problem again. Shizuru is next to me, but is hardly paying attention to my dilemma. But I can't blame her. She's focused on the oncoming swarm. None of us will survive if we don't find some escape fast. Both sides of the bridge are closing.

I'm coughing. Blood. I hack a splatter onto the ground. Not a clear, flowing spit of blood. No... a sticky, ugly drizzle that hangs off my lips. A dehydrated, gummy substance that I have to bark up to be able to breathe. This scares me enough to put tears in my eyes. _What is going on_? Without looking at me, Shizuru puts a hand on my hunched back. She understands that I'm in deep pain, but she also can't do much for me at this point in time. So an offered hand is about as far as she can help in this situation. That truth hurts me just as much as the stomach pain. There is no help.

Then the coughing blood turns to vomit. I feel a gag heave on the back of my throat before I cough again and suddenly spew my lungs out. _What has triggered this? _This is where I get really worried. So does the rest of the group, partly watching me, partly trying to figure a getaway. I can't explain nor even think of a suitable cause of what's happening to me.

God, I haven't even had anything to eat. So it's only bile blazing up my throat. Shizuru does what she can to pat my back to help clear my throat, to keep close to me, but she can't help but focus on threats elsewhere.

When this initial puking is over, I stand up straighter, better, on quivering legs. But I soon learn that is a horrible decision. My torso is a rubber band being stretched as I uncurl from bending over. Awful and tightly nauseating. I'm lightheaded. I'm quickly off my balance. I stumble, still relatively choking.

This is when the worst part hits. I do feel the short guardrail against the back of my legs, but there's nothing I can do by that point. I'm struggling enough to not be able to stop myself. Out of reaction, I flail my limbs, but this is no help.

I might've shrieked in surprise because I almost have enough time to see Shizuru turn.

I flip. Going over swiftly, and unexpectedly, the air is crushed out of me like being hit by a truck.

I'm falling. I'm struck by both sick and tugging feelings of falling and also from my stomach. Then these dropping sensations absorb all my consciousness. I truly black out while falling.

Then, cold. All I can think is fucking cold. This must wake me somewhat. Enough to be able to hear my thoughts.

But I'm not thinking coherently, if at all. I don't know where the bridge went, but I do understand that I'm in the wrong freaking place. I'm in the water. Not breathing.

Once the bone-chilling temperature of the water sets in for a good moment, I start to reawaken. The pressure on my stomach is somewhat relieved in this easy gravity. But I'm faced with new problems: the waves and the cold. The cold stabs at me quickly and relentlessly, like a snake with a thousand fangs. My only distinct feeling is needles.

I bob up to the surface, having to be carried back up. I spew out whatever is clogging my breathing, to suck in much needed air. I can do this conciously as the needles of the cold water have shivered me awake.

Somewhere distantly above and behind me I hear shouts of my name. I open my eyes wide in shock, mouth-breathing and beating my arms to stay above the current. I know how to swim, but the ability to perform this action correctly escapes me.

I find the bridge, twirling in the current, looking backwards to find my friends all lined against the ledge I fell from. I find Shizuru among them. Then just before going under again, I watch in confused horror as she puts a foot up onto the railing, stepping up onto it.

Then I'm dragged back underwater. It feels like my foot is tugged by someone, powerfully spinning me in a loop until I don't know which way is up. If being chased by the undead wasn't unnerving enough, not knowing which way is up in deep water is an utterly horrifying experience. I quickly peel my eyes open underwater, desperately searching for a way out. And then yet another thing burns my body. Saltwater. This proves not to be of no help anyway, through this bubbly, murky, off-blue cannot tell which way to swim or at least float. I don't know what to do. This must be how being on the helpless brink of death, and knowing it, feels like.

The upside-down does no good for my stomach. The feeling of near puking is revived again, that infamous wrenching on the organs behind your ribs begins, but I desperately hold back what I can so I don't drown.

However fate is merciful in the next second as I break the surface once more. I'm so grateful the flow has pushed me back up because I can't seem to do it myself. I cough and sputter for another gulp of air.

Orientating myself is then my next priority, but only after breathing. I'm able to locate the bridge, after paging through a finite amount of pain-orientated thoughts clogging my mind. But I can no longer see my girl among them. And so I start swearing, in the few breaths I take, like my life depends on it. I can't think of what has happened to her. _Where has she gone?_

For another lung-wrenching time, the current takes me under in its flow in the overlapping pattern I noticed earlier. I'm _in_ that pattern now. It warps my perception of up and down once more. And once more, I'm out of my mind with terror, I have no room to think of other things. This water is not an enemy I can defeat, like everything else I've been dealing with for my past disconnected half year. No matter how much I beat the water with my swinging arms, I cannot win. It's too strong and out of my control. The most awful part, I think, is how I cannot order myself to be unconscious for all this. In which case, I have to watch and feel myself die or I have to keep trying.

I don't think I quite ready to give up yet. I didn't give up in all my time alone. Something inside is pulling at me, a human nature to want to survive. But something more deep-rooted and sincere urges me not to give up completely yet… A warm reason tugs at my mind, but I can't quite grasp it.

And then back up. My abused torso pushes out a mouthful of water and needing to take something back in, I heave in jumpy gasps.

"Natsuki!" My name sounds close. Even through pulled jerked about in this current, I feel more refreshed... in the worst way. But I am more aware now then I was on solid ground. Shivering, but aware. Violently moving, making my stomach forcefully retch its empty contents again, but I'm aware. Aware that there is another figure in this river with me now.

Snap connections hit me in an instant after my second fit of being sick ends, which worries me for my lung's sake. An uncontrollable stomach bug is the last thing I want to have to deal with in churning tides. I flick my hair to the side to be able to see. I feel a wet streak of hair land horizontally across my forehead in an untidy fashion, and I don't deal with it, like I would have if I were not in a dire situation, making my appearance probably more desperate.

The connections I've come up with say that a walker has followed me in. But my reflexes to sand-colored hair tell me otherwise.

"Natsuki!" No, god, _it is_ her voice. More with the swearing until my words only become fizzled bubbles. I'm not able to tread hard enough to keep myself above water. I'm tossed around in a place I can't breathe and the surprise of this third snatching of me by the torrent catches me so off-guard, I swallow the saltwater.

Putrid. And damn salty. I officially conclude this water as undrinkable, finally being forced to taste it for myself. The brine rendering it prickly and scratchy. It's not good. I had tried to hold it only in my mouth, but no, I swallowed it. First, a mouthful. But with the surge ripping at me, it yanks my mouth open. What is first a gulp is suddenly twenty and more.

Besides the seawater, this feels like nothing short of _freezing_-temperature waters. So not only does my sickness get to me, but the numb of iced blood-flow does too. Hypothermia has its chilly hands around my throat. I can feel it setting into my bones.

I'm fighting more than one factor while trying to swim. So I ultimately fail in my condition. I can feel now that I've reached a point along the bottom of the canal where the current pushes all its waste. I'm underneath the flow.

I'm not getting back up. Not by my own power. Only being shoved downwards. The rolling swells keep me stuck. I can't count on one hand how many times I've been to this threshold of death and back since this apocalypse started. But drowning… I never would have thought in a world full of flesh-eaters, this would be how I go down.

None of these thoughts make me chuckle though. The last thought I register is for my girl. If I could only distinguish my tears from the ocean…

I can't hold my breath any longer. I'm out. I'm done. The stress takes my conscious self out of the picture, _finally,_ so I don't have to feel my gruesome end.

In my fairytale-filed imagination, I see an angel. She is, of course, an angel. A halo surrounds the edges of her long, flowing hair. The light behind her makes her face unreadable. A silhouetted face and body. Graceful in movement and they're reaching down. Down? Where does that make me? Hell?

It's very clear how they progress towards me. Just with no distinctive features I can tell. My eyes are open and staring at this being in awe. I don't make an attempt to respond to this figure, like a child in amazement. I have no urge to move. There's an odd warmth that comes over me. Odd because it feels out of place… I feel out of place...

Noise strikes me. The Earth just hasn't had enough of me it seems. Crashing, deafening white noise. And a different chill runs through me. A new, bright coolness. An airy breeze.

Then time is sped up again. I'm yanked upwards. And my subconscious recognizes the power to breathe in this environment.

Deliriously, I notice a body is grasping mine. A real body. Not any mythical immortal. They're holding me up more than themselves as their body shakes insanely too. But I notice we shake for different reasons. They are keeping us afloat, swimming harshly, while I've been in this frigid pool for far too long.

I'm talked to sweetly, mostly my name, with some additional gentle remarks. I'm held close. And for all I'm worth, I cuddle into this. Between our wet clothes I still feel body heat.  
>I know who this is, although my linking of this fact takes me a bit, but it is Shizuru.<p>

She's got me somehow. Somehow, for yet another time, she's both found me and saved my life. And we're floating. Nicely. I'm too far off to think otherwise.

That is, until we are near the wall. The tide also swings you from side to side as well as shaking you in the up and down motion. Dangerously close to the side. It isn't long before I start to hear, then legitimately detect our friends shouting to us and running alongside the manmade riverbank. _Running._ Racing to keep us with our 'floating'. Shizuru responds to them because she's more together than I am, I know that. I can't even tell what is it she yells back. My eyelids are dizzily lowering. Flickering.

My wonderful protector notices this, "Natsuki? Hey, stay awake." She says urgently. I don't think she quite understands what's happening to me.

Again, we have with multiple factors to deal with, or rather, she does. I feel her swimming become more frantic. Kicking directly to one side, away from the concrete side we're heading for.

After she's through trying to kick our way out, I recognize that it's not the waves that force us to switch places, but her doing. She's now the one closest to the approaching cement block edge.

Then, even with my eyes half-lidded involuntarily, I watch Shizuru's head fall forward as we bounce off the edge of the segment we cannot evade. I listen to a hideous whack I only barely register as a human hit. Specifically a thwack on flesh and bone, similar the sound when I've hit walkers with melee objects. Her head is pushed forward as if smacked from the back and now only hangs down in place.

It slowly comes to me, through my aggressive shivering at this point, that I would've been in that position had she not moved herself in harm's way… instead of me…

"Shi-" My voice is a rasp, quieted from lack of warmth, my jaw and throat almost frozen. I cough before I can get her full name out, "Zuru?" Why aren't you moving? What's up?

I stiffly bring a hand to her cheek, her face is cold. Too cold, _damn it_. But with no more resistance against the current for staying in the air, and not much strength holding us together any longer, we're washed over.

I'm dimly aware of the red that inks into the surrounding water while I try to keep my eyes open to understand where I'm being tumbled to, over my head and over again.

It's difficult for me to tell what precisely occurs next because I am too far-gone by now. I can't think straight.  
>It hurts to be uninformed of your own situation, but that pain is eased when you aren't even aware that you don't know what's going on.<p>

At some point, an arm is wrapped around my waist. Completely encircling the front of my torso. Then, upwards.

I break into air coughing and my shivering so greatly, I can't control it. I'm completely out of the water now; I can feel that because of the way my sensitivity to the temperature goes through the roof. In the unprotected air, I can't help but let the tremors run through me.

I really am desperately trying to open my eyes, but it's like the lids themselves have been frozen shut. The rest of me must have frost coating I'm sure. All I can do is shudder to get rid of this freezing chill.

As if timed with my thoughts, I feel warmer fingers caress my face, and they run gently over my closed eyes. I have to pull away from the touch, it's too hot. It burns.

I can hear rather clearly once I'm out of the raging rapids. I feel myself on solid surface now. There is panting and grunting nearby. And scampering, like how an animal would dive out of harm's way. More likely though: sneakers on gravelly pavement.

I wouldn't say my thinking ability is already back to lucid yet because everything is still very fogged over from my frigid exposure, but the knowledge of my group of friends who had been with me, and running alongside me and Shizuru as we drifted in the river, is a thought that has been totally embedded in my mind as of yesterday as something I can't drop even with the worst case of uncertainty.

I can imagine that they have something to do with… what is this…? A rescue? I _am_ out the water. I would consider this being rescued. But maybe it's too soon to say that. I've forgotten during my brief swim what kind of world we live in now.  
>By default, I credit my schoolmates with saving my life. Especially Shizuru.<p>

Wait… Shizuru? What happened to her? I want to believe my gamble of an idea that the brief touch I felt just now was her, but that's not certain.

I cannot direct my mouth. I would like to speak, but can only utter hoarse syllables from the back of my throat, my jaw stuck. It's something similar to not being able to scream in a dream. So I'm trapped, scarcely feeling my blue lips only shake.

Soon enough though, comfort arrives. Again, they try my eyes and it's too hot. I move away, jerking my neck unsteadily. However, they are persistent, brushing over my eyelashes repeatedly.

"Shh, it's okay Natsuki," I'm sure it's her voice, I'm relieved. But... how? Am I dead?

"You-you... are…" I can't get out an understandable sentence. But that seems to be enough for now because Shizuru, it's definitely her, wraps her arms around me. I have settled into myself precariously for heat and her arms serve to insulate me more. She's far warmer, and dryer.

"You're ok." Sugarcoated words help thaw me. These words are nice to hear but are contradicted immediately by gunfire. I jump and the arms latch around my neck. Next the arms shift and I'm actually lifted off the ground.

I am a mix of feelings. It's nice to know that I can still feel these things, just to know I'm not one of _them._ Not dead. Her comfort is the umbrella to all the discomfort I had been feeling. All of the sickness and cold are not gone. Not finished with me by far. But this is a step up.

Peeling my eyes open, I can see familiar porcelain skin, my head bobbing with the running now, I tilt up to… short black hair?

I squirm the best I can in the state I'm in. No! _No!  
><em>I don't want to be carried by Kanzaki! Not in any lifetime! _Where is Shizuru?_

"Shi…" I manage, letting my neck slack, able to look behind Reito at a limping group of faces I know. However, I don't see the face of my babe. Only the still drooping and inattentive head of wet tan hair between two supportive other's shoulders. Mai and Chie each have one of Shizuru's arms around their shoulders, holding her up. Her feet: dragging. Can't she do it herself? Can't she walk on her own? What is wrong?

Reito starts running like fuck is at his back. This rapid new up and down bouncing throws my stomach. Reito adjusts my head just in time, making me feel better, so I won't empty my empty gut yet again. Also so I don't develop a migraine from the way my head is hanging, because I can't pick it up for myself. I'm surprised by the amount of affection he puts into carrying me. His right arm under my legs and his left under my shoulders.

Where he's rushing me to, I don't know. Is there any sanctuary in this destruction? I think sarcastically. All I can register is the pain of this movement and the blankness of the space next to me… Where have we left my girl? _What have you done Kanzaki?_

I let myself dangle over my stupid savior's arms uselessly. I can do no more. My muscles have been deteriorating over the time I've been alone, while I've been unable to feed myself properly. I have no strength left.

We're leant back as if Reito sat down, to counter that idea I hear a 'bang' from him kicking something. I see him kick at the door to another burnt building. Easily, it swings open.

The struggle to stay awake resumes. With my eyelids twinkling yet again, I'm not entirely sensitive to all my surroundings. I only pick up on obvious information, not so much the small details.

I'm a little startled to see Nao rush in before us because I didn't see her running with us. She holds a Glock outright cop-style should there be threats inside. She fires once, twice, then invites us in after her with a hand gesture. There seems to be an understanding here between these two as to where we're going and what we're doing, which I'm not receiving.

With the small amount of consciousness I have left to work with, I scan the area. It's a store, distinctive because of its rows of stock. The putrid sharp smell of rotting meat engulfs me. I discern the smell as spoiled seafood, _not_ human decay. This shop probably sold fish and they couldn't be preserved through the summer apocalypse. I'm suddenly closer to puking again because of the sour stench, but at the same time, curiously hungry. I haven't gotten to eat seafood in a long time. I miss all the coastal Japanese food that can't be prepared at this time. All comforts gone. All the things we had been used to for centuries turned upsidedown.

Reito very carefully and gently places me on tiled flooring, leaning me against an emptied shelf. I become aware of how hard I'm breathing because Reito puts the back of his hands to my cheeks.

"You're ok." He orders sweetly, speaking to me with the tone I must of deliriously mistaken for Shizuru.  
>"Shizu-!" I cough, quickly becoming worried as to where my girl is. Neither Mai nor Chie has entered with her still slung around their shoulders. Where the hell is she? What happened?<p>

Reito stands, then with an unnerving amount of command in his voice, he turns to Nao before running further into the store, "Strip her."

I realize now that just as suddenly as I fell into the water, my accumulated three layers of clothes have become useless in the cold air. Yet, they are the only things keeping me slightly protected and decent! So I try to stagger onto my feet, but only melt forward to my knees. I'm pleading with Nao before she does anything, "No, no… I- don't." I give her the best stern face I can and hold up one hand to feebly stop her, the other keeping me upright against the floor.

Nao appears torn between following the direction for doing what's best for me, or submitting to my whims. She stands still with a sympathetic expression (the sweetest expression I've ever seen on her). She inches closer to me,

"It's alright, it's alright," I'm told times over while I continue to fight her meekly. We both understand why this needs to happen. I will only get worse otherwise. But I do not want to undress now! What kind of sick joke is this!

Once she's got my jackets and shoes off (nevermind the amount of bitching and squirming I give her), Shizuru is walked in through the doorway. _Walked_, rather than dragged, a small comfort which I note, into our new hideout.

"Shizuru!" I put my full effort into clearing her whole name with a new exuberant beam on my face. _She is okay!_ And awake now! Maybe only drowsily, with the way her head somewhat dips. But I can see the difference in how she's picked up her face more so her eyes are visible now. She has improved in the time since Reito had sprinted off with me. She sees me.

"Zuru!" I still shout at her, slurring because it rolls off the tongue faster_. I'm right here, 'Zuru!_ I direct her in my thoughts. I'm so happy to see her, but as Mai lowers her, an aspect concerns me. The motion of being helped down makes her hair fall sideways and strands of red tainted tresses come into view.  
>… Blood?<p>

Shizuru is let down to my level. Looking closer in the way she acts, she appears to have more conscious power than I do, yet still shows signs of haziness. _Are you still hurt Shi?_ She manages to scoot herself closer to where I'm sitting with Nao kneeling next to me.

"Hey," She can speak. She reaches up and brushes my wet hair away in a fashion only she can do. Then drops her hand to my shoulder, where she must be able to feel my erratic heartbeat pulsing through my veins. I let out a large exhale, letting myself slump as if I had been working so hard to hold myself up this whole time.

I want nothing more than to stay in her soothing contact but we're interrupted as a pile of fabric is dropped onto our laps. Reito has returned with blankets from somewhere for us. He scrutinizes Shizuru, now that's she's here. Then motioning his index finger and wrist in a circle to my girl, he conveys some serious message. She catches his drift right away, nodding, understanding something I don't. She then grips the bottom hem of her coat and pulls it off over her head too. _What... are we doing?_

Reito and the others, save for Nao with us, sprint off back into the store. There must be an urgent cause. I'm not… we're not… the urgent cause… are we?

Nao briefly starts to unbutton my pants before Shizuru takes over. I'm surprised to see my golden-haired girl back from comatose so fast, while I remain a feverish icicle. She pulls off my jeans before slipping off her soaking clothes too.

Once we're completely humiliated, naked in the open, she hugs me. The water must've already started the process of hypothermia, mostly on me I suppose. She wasn't in the water as long as I was. I have been too affected to have noticed how bad I really am. Nao drapes the blankets over us. With these elements meeting my icy skin, I'm instantly warmer. Burning up, as if being touched by needles again, but it's better than being river-temperature cold.

However, nothing is fair in this world. Nothing is set or safe.  
>Groaning and ragged panting catches us all off guard. Scarred, sagging bodies shamble into the store. They have followed us here.<p>

Shizuru gasps, seeing them before I do. She slides us hurriedly across the linoleum floor, pushing with bare feet away from the entrance, with me cradled in her lap now. I notice that with our shoes off, the cold had gotten underneath both of our shoes, and we have the tiniest amount of discoloring blooming on the ends of our toes.

From nowhere, Reito appears. He's already got the butt of his machine gun up and ready. He smashes it into the skull of the first walker, bravely heading right for them. He doesn't shoot to make as little noise as possible.  
>Anyone can see his eyes scream anger. He might not be over that meeting of the two men earlier. Or maybe it's something deeper… something more emotionally conflicting. I almost want to say he looks happy… like he wants to kill…<p>

He continues to jab at the crawlers, pushing them out. Their faces, with their skin infected and filled with pus, 'burst open'. Shizuru turns away, not wanting to see the fresh gore from so close. I don't know what I can do for her. But lucky for us, we have other real people with us, we have a wall of defense: Reito seems unfazed, with an endless amount of energy to slaughter.

"Nao!" He yells for the person closest him. She goes around him and grabs the previously flung open store door and slams it almost shut. A rotted arm clogs the way. Inhumanely, they jam it back outside, possibly breaking it in the twisted, crackling way they hurl it out. Nao slumps against the door as soon as it's closed, as does Reito, to hold them out. They shout for someone to bring barricade items.

These mindless people are part of a fear embedded in the back of our minds that we cannot control. We _must_ be scared of them. They are a threat to our safety. The ancient concept of 'fight or flight' kicks in full-throttle here. Conversely though, they seem far more neutralized when you are in someone else's arms. That classic horrific anticipation of turning those blind corners, of walking into those dark abysses'; alone, these challenges seem far worse... but with others, they're not as bad.  
>Of course, other live people are not the cure to the way we cannot help but jump in surprise at the appearance of a zombie. But it is nicer, and safer.<p>

The ones Reito and Nao shove out stay just outside the glass shop doors, clawing for access to us. Quiet squeaks of glass screech through just centimeters. A lot of times, when barely separated from these creatures by a wall's width, it's hardest to ignore them. I think we deserve a goddamn break! I reach up to Shizuru's face and push her cheek to look away from the windows. It really difficult to tune out life-size people, but I try. She understands what I do, and gives me a weary smile. She means to express a mix of 'thank you' and 'get well soon'.

I certainly feel more tired now. This event has shocked me into fatigue. My view shutters, and I am powerless to contain this exhaustion. I must let that show because she closes the distance between us in a concerned hug.

The rapid switching in body temperature, the traumatic experiences, the sickness that has runny blood still drizzling out of my mouth, all of it is cause for me to drift off now. Different from the swift shutter of blacking out, though still a speedy disconnection from the world, I fall asleep.


	8. Broken

**Fallen ~**

I'm better at visualizing and storytelling through making movies. If I could make this a movie for you, I would.

Enjoy my past month's efforts.

**Chapter Eight**

**Broken ~**

And then I slip. I fall. I'm in a different place. My eyes are open now and I register that. That I've woken up. I pick my head up because I have slid a little off Shizuru's shoulder, like how someone would slide awake on a long car ride. The world is still slightly blurred and far away, but I understand that I was only dreaming. A distinction hits me separating my dreams from reality.

I shift after this realization, also suddenly receiving the memories of the dead everywhere. I force myself to be more alert to look out for walkers anywhere nearby. This 'memory' is planted so deep in my subconscious these days I can't avoid it if I wanted to; if I wanted peace.

Even though I think about it after all my surroundings, my unusual bedding is practically the first thing I notice from awakening. Shizuru still has her arms around me like how I had fallen asleep, and she has her eyes closed now too. And most noticeably we are still unclothed under the blankets. Miraculously, I think Reito's technique worked though. I am feeling warmer now. And I'm feeling better. My stomach has stopped its unrelenting assault. However, those events have left me drained. I can feel how much more weakened I have become.

I give myself a mental scolding for the manner in which I passed out. According to the rules of survival these days, one is not supposed to 'give out' at any random place. Especially without checking for protection. What was I thinking? I'm mad at myself now for being so weak. You get bit, it's game over. That is the ultimate low to avoid, the one thing you cannot let happen. I remember the barricading of the door and the people outside, so close to getting in. No safety in that at all. Damn my lousy, fading endurance! The connections I think of cause my to blame my level of endurance.

But then I gradually start to believe that with everything that happened earlier, I'm not sure I could control staying awake or not.

Semi-satisfied with my conclusion of being too sickly fatigued earlier I let a breath out that we are safe anyway. Except we are not in the same place when I had closed my eyes. We have been moved further back into the store, away from the store windows. I look around at the racks. Mostly empty, as expected. I'm nestled into my babe's lap, and she's leant on a shelf behind us. I don't think I like sitting in the middle of the aisle like this. I can't see over the racks. If there is a threat somewhere in this room, we wouldn't be able to see it until it's right on top of us. It makes me antsy.

With my wiggling, her eyes soon open as well. I don't watch her open them but she lowers her head with control like only one can while awake. She rests her forehead against the back my hair in front of her, as if too tired to hold it up herself.

Then in a surprising moment of dejavu from what I was just dreaming, she moves her face closer so our cheeks almost touch. She gives a kiss to my ear. I shiver, exactly how I had dreamt I would.

This action, however scarily familiar, relieves me of the rekindled fear for her health. Last I recall she could hardly walk on her own. She must be revived enough now to being kissing my ear and face. I'm sure she's better now.

We don't speak because we're aware that we're both up now. I tilt my head a bit into her kisses to respond. Then it's when I tilt this much that I can see up the aisle to the windows. I am quick to pick up on this visual.

I'm glad to see the walkers have dispersed. But this raises two concerns. One, where have they gone? And two, how long have I been asleep?

Something beyond the store catches my eye. Through a light drizzle of rain, there is heavy movement in one particular place outside. Rapid movement that looks clearly human, with purpose and not brain dead, with only carnal motors working. I can't see this person's face clearly from this distance, but the bright red hair links to someone I know. Someone who is within our little group. So this recognition stops me from becoming excited at the idea of more survivors.

Nao is outside repeatedly beating something, what I can only imagine is one of the dead, on the ground with what's appears to be a bat with all the energy she has. When she seems to attract too much noise and another of the living dead straggles to her, my breath hitches. This grab's Shizuru's attention and she also looks in the same direction. There's no reason fro her to be out there! No reason to lose anyone else! We need to go get her. I make to stand up. But I am quickly back down on sore legs. Shi wraps me up tighter, forbidding me to leave once she's seen that I am still frail.

I struggle at this for a moment, eyes still locked on Nao outside. But then the girl turns. And it's when she swings her bat rather gracefully up into the jaw of the oncoming walker, and it drops, that I cool. With not too many around anymore, I see that she does have control. She's okay because with my eyes darting I also observe Reito propped beside the shop doorway with his gun, spotting her.

Something must have her so worked up. Or it might just be one of those times when you just have to let everything out. For different people, this idea of 'letting it out' changes. For me, I was similar to Nao, coping by spending all my energy by angrily beating on things. I could see no other way to deal. I know I used to get so livid on my own, for being on my own. That's why I'd do it. I'd feel that guilt of not saving people. Guilt from not saving her. And that feeling was not something I could ever take lightly. Others times, when those memories would come onto me more gradually, I might sit and cry tiredly. But not when the anger swept over me. Not when I was triggered.

I continue to gaze out the large store windows. I ignore all the areas of five equidistant scratch marks on the plexiglass. The next things I see are the identifiable river blocks. We're above the river now so I can't see the water level I was just in, but the cement edges reach above the manmade banks. There's a feature about these blocks that differs from the edges on the other side. I find the ones closer to us, on this side, to be the ones we were running alongside earlier. But it's not the look of them that matter. No… it's their look that tells me: we never made it across the channel. Everyone must've been forced back to the side we started on once we were in the water.

These thoughts are interrupted and I rip my focus to back inside the building when I feel and hear footsteps coming towards us. I'm on edge and I again resort to springing up, but am held down by Shizuru. She has a face that says it's okay.

Mai walks around the corner of the nearest shelf holding a pile of fabric. She suddenly seems distracted seeing my face, interested. But she doesn't ask the question to me, "Is she doing better now?" Mai's question is directed to my protector. I wonder why, when Mai has just seen that I am awake now.

Shizuru tips her head to the side curiously, to see my face. Then deciding I can handle it, she reaches up and pinches my nose. She holds her clamp there until I start to whine, "Shi! Stop it! Let go! Let go!" I let my old, easily irritated persona get the better of me.

Then she easily lets go, and looks happily up to Mai again, "Yes, she's fine." She is smiling as I rub my nose babyishly. Mai snickers under her breath and drops the clothes she's holding with us, "Just a scare," Shizuru adds with a hint of her old personality: notorious for purposely dramatically understating things. Mai then leaves us to get changed.

I slowly realize that Shizuru never would've done that, made a joke out of our hardships and injuries, unless there was a definite that I was okay. She knows that I am doing better than before because she knows me too well.

"You don't have a fever," Shi says as she puts a gentle hand to my forehead. Then she pulls away abruptly, as soon as I was beginning to appreciate our warmth, to look me severely in the eye, "Why didn't you tell me you're sick?" The word 'sick' immediately snaps together with 'zombies' in my head. I wonder if there was ever any doubt in anyone's mind if I was still human while I was sick. I wonder if part of Reito's command to strip me was also to search for bites. Bites could've caused what they saw, as far as anyone knows…

Sickness. Besides the one, most notable sickness nowadays that has completely taken over people in a different fashion than any other sickness, I guess I had forgotten (until recently at least) that the world's other diseases still linger in the air. Fresh and ripe for a double-team attack on survivors of the 'zombie creation virus'.

"I didn't know…" I still don't know what it is that's wrong with me. I've had the flu before and it does not feel like this. This sensation is closer to a grinding and burning than the sting of bile and not being able to hold down food from the flu, although those flu symptoms seem to be a contributor to whatever the total illness is that I have caught. Because I've obviously caught _something_. My insides are in some sort of disarray and… with an edge of horror to my realization: I'm powerless to fix it.

Then there is a kiss. After a moment, I am the one to draw back. She's shouldn't have done that. She really shouldn't have done that.

"That shouldn't scream 'kiss me', Shizuru." I chastise her monotonously, while somewhat trying to keep back a grin. It's weird how within the time we've met up, how many times we've smiled. Even at a shit time like this, after coming back from freezing and dying, somehow we light each other up. If I didn't know any better, yes, I might say that's true, but I don't think that is really the case. It's our entire experience leading up to being back together again that makes us so thankful. And the fact that we are actually the last people alive. It's not that we met again through all the other people, it's that we have nothing and no one else left.

But that doesn't change how we were before all this. We did not simply get together now because we have nothing left, we did have a relationship before. And that is what makes us unique from any other survivors. We had something special to begin with that carries on now and we are not random. Regardless of the means of how we ended up meeting again, we had a past. Wonderful, blissful memories.

"Are you okay?" I ask her. I spill this out without thinking about it too much. I remember vaguely the events in the water. Are you hurt Shi? I am not cautious going about how she might need care right now and how I want to take care of her.

"Just a headache," She shakes my question away with an odd, supposedly reassuring expression. I know what she's doing. She has done it before. I know you better than that, Shi-chan. _You do too much for me_.  
>Again, she puts herself and her needs aside for my care. Despite whatever her injuries may be, screw it all if I am hurt in the slightest! Screw it all if I need "insistent care" for the best possible recovery. <em>Damn it Shizuru.<em>

I nod. I'll handle what comes my way should she be understating her condition. For now, we pull the shirts over our heads and pull on the pants Mai had found.

Shizuru is careful to survey me when I try to rise off the floor. I try valiantly not to show her any signs of wobbliness. I'm doing much better and even surprise myself at my speedy improvement.  
>Maybe my threshold for pain has been lowered and so my ordeal seemed much worse to me. When in reality, it wasn't all that bad. Maybe I'm getting softer around Shizuru again…<p>

She almost reaches to support my arm as we start to walk into the middle of the store where the others are congregated. But I yank my arm away to say 'I can do it'. So she drags in a long, overworked sigh through her nose, maybe rolling her eyes, agreeing to my stubbornness.

We sit ourselves in the semi-circle of Mai, Chie and Takumi. However, as soon as we've settled with them, I wrench my neck around to face the down the aisle out the window. Nao is still out there, right? Sure enough, there is still an angry figure swinging a stick at people. _People._ This makes me scramble to get up, forgetting the safety here and paying ultimate attention to my friend outside. She can't be out there! It's unsafe! No matter what you do, it's not safe. Not after what I've seen: innocent people being pulled down to their gruesome fates by these_ things_. Things that used to be their friends and family. Being killed by their hands. It's not sane! Not after all the crowds we attracted earlier. Those guys are probably all remaining around somewhere nearby anyway.

I slip because of my socks on linoleum, having an issue standing up, straightening my stomach out. This scares Shizuru more than I meant to. She spins to face me, still perched on her knees. Then for a moment I see, because she catches my attention with her quick movement, I notice her stall. She looks as if she just woke up for an instant, which we did, but I mean at the very second of awakening. Something slows her as if she can't focus, blurry. Something in her eyes fogs over. But these symptoms only last for a second. She obviously forces herself to be better in the next instant because they are righted.

After that moment, I gain a new worry for her. What if she was seriously understating her well-being? I can easily imagine that's something she would do. So I spend an extra second looking into her eyes. The ruby eyes that plead with me not to go anywhere. That I should recuperate here for longer, so I can handle the horrors that lurk outside. And stay with her…

"What is Nao doing out there?" I ask the group of generally unharmed individuals who have probably been awake while I was asleep. I leave the difficult, unspoken battle between Shizuru and I and turn to where the real answers would come from. I won't run out there just yet. That would be stupid not to think through things at all.

"Just… uh… hitting stuff." Mai says sheepishly, using an almost uncaring tone, "I don't know," She also mutters. _Does Nao not matter to all of you? Do more survivors not matter to you guys?_ We need more _people _to survive this. Not ugly diseased cannibals. Not them. There's too many of those people. We need everyone we can get now.

"And that's alright?" I ask angrily. I'm immediately fuming that 'letting her take out her anger' is the answer. I admit that what she's doing is something similar to what I used to do. And I also admit that here in no-man's-land; it's a necessary to take one's anger out. Otherwise, you will lose your mind.

But I had more cause! With all of us together, she doesn't need to be taking unnecessary risks. We are finally safer together, with more people, and she's' doing this! Something about this whole situation tips me over the edge. Maybe I just haven't been getting enough sleep and food and I'm irritable.

"Reito is outside with her. She's fine," Chie adds. I stare crossly at them, still not seeing their logic. What are they thinking? Everyone stays together!

I get past this fury though as the door flies open with a starling whack. I am immediately tense, but when we all look to the storefront, it's only the other two of our group coming back in.

"It's raining." A slightly damp Nao enters and announces this in monotone, but anyone can clearly see from her features that she is livid. Probably about having to come back inside. You were having too much damn fun, weren't you Nao? Reito strolls in expressionless around her, with his own weapon propped on his shoulder.

I breathe a sigh of relief. It's better. Everyone is inside, together. Not having been with people for so long I think has made me more sensitive with people again. We need to work together.

What is a person worth these days? Everyone needs everyone else.

_Of course I need you, Shizuru._

* * *

><p>I've been sitting for a while. But no matter what I do to get comfortable, I can't shake the feeling of anxiety. That feeling that I've forgotten something but can't place what it is. Have I left any belongings anywhere? Do I even have any belongings? What is it that's nagging on me?<p>

It has started raining harder, which adds to the looming feeling I have. I can't place it, so that makes me think I'm only worried about the zeds. A normal horror now. Something that would still jerk on my subconscious senses but shouldn't be all that surprising. They are merely barriers to get through. That's a good way to think of them actually. Singly, they aren't too bad. One by one, you could take them down with organized beating. Keep your distance from them and hit them cleanly with melee objects until they fall. It's very simple really and not too bad. It's when they're in crowds that you should be careful. They're harder to take together.

But for now, I'm stuck staring out the large store windows. I'm not near any zombies nor am I in danger of any of them getting to me. You can't be worried all the time. Even though the world has gone to fuck, you will go bald if you spend all of your time worrying. It's difficult, but all the small things make a difference now. Living with having to watch over your shoulder eats you from the inside out. It's paranoia. And if paranoia has a constant grip on your throat, you will go insane here. The world has not gotten bigger or scarier. If anything, it has shrunk. And we have become more afraid of its contents.

The others, except for me and Mai who were left downstairs to man the doors, have gone upstairs. There are hardly any buildings in Tokyo that are below several stories. Convenience stores like this usually have apartments and possibly other stores stacked on top of it. Judging from this type of shop that we're in now, I'd say we've left Shibuya's fancy shopping districts and prominent high-class buildings and we are in a lower-class living area now.

I fiddle lightly with the weapon that has been dropped with me as I glance between it and out the full window I'm sitting next to. Because of my supposed ill state of health, or so Shizuru believes. I've been asked to basically guard the doors with an automatic, and not travel upstairs before I 'feel' that I'm up to it. I'm feeling far less sick now though. Whatever bug it is that I have has died down now, thank god.

Any other time here in zombie-land, I would argue that guarding the door is the most difficult and physically intensive job there is between a group of people with different jobs. If there were to be a break-in, Mai and I would be the ones to handle it. It wouldn't be smart to leave your disabled, sick group members downstairs to deal with all that, and that's not even including the constant surveying and watch-duty that is included with this position.

But, right now, combined with Nao having soundlessly beaten the shit out of any stragglers and our tail from earlier wondering off, there isn't much activity. It is getting dark fast with all these storm clouds and I'd like to find a room with preferably more than one entrance and no windows. I don't want to be this close to these windows that I have to watch out of now. Those things could come up right next to me. Just thinking about that is already way too close for comfort. I do suppose this is a better spot, than if the were walkers too close to a door and then not being able to see them before I open the door. That's no fun either, if they are _right there_ when you open an exit.

I don't see anything now. There are no walkers, no crawlers, no draggers or twitchers. Oddly quiet. But kind of peaceful… yes, you could think of it like that. With the rain and everything…

Then all of a sudden, only lasting for the blink of an eye, I see through the sheets of rain outside a glimmer of something shiny. Something clearly sparkles outside in the street. Not any walkers, which would also catch my jumpy attention. Just a small object in the rain, fairly close to the shop. Having been watching so keenly from my lookout post, I saw it clearly reflect a cartoon-like twinkle.

I shouldn't care. I don't. I totally don't… No, that's a lie. Without any entertainment like I used to have in the good old days, I'm bored off my ass. So even a little glitter sparks my attention. With nothing else going on, I'm intrigued. My tired eyes scan where I was just looking. It doesn't continually radiate. It was there for only a second. I wonder what light in this storm reflected upon it and made the item shimmer? A break in the clouds?

I wonder… I try to keep my interest to a minimum so I don't lose myself paying so much attention to such a small thing. But I'm finding that with infinite boredom comes ultimate ADD.

I stand and make it look as if I've risen to stretch so Mai does not care about my minor action.

I decide that I need a break. A real break. I take a few mindless steps and suddenly I'm at the door. We have yet to heavily barricade the thin, plastic convenience store doorway, except for the few plywood shelf parts that we've placed against it. I gingerly start the process of removing the fencing to be able to walk out the entrance. Unfortunately, this quickly catches Mai's attention.

"Natsuki? What are you doing?" She had been sitting on the opposite side of the row of store windows, but has now risen in response to my behavior. I don't spare her a glance because I know she will stop me, but I think not replying in any fashion worries her more. It'd be so easy for anyone to lose their mind after six months of hell. It's a probability. I think I might be freaking her out with that idea as she starts to approach me, to stop me from picking any more at our pathetic barrier. But I need to see it…

"Natsu-" There. I open the door then rush outside into the ugly squall, but don't mind it. I immediately begin the search for the glimmering spot. I go to where I saw it last.

I hear my name again, but pay no attention to it. I think Mai gives me a chance to prove myself; either that or she isn't quite as willing as I am to hurry out into the pouring rain. But soon enough she tromps out to get me.

I kneel in the mud-washed street. I'm lucky enough to find what I'm looking for before Mai reaches me. And also lucky enough to have found exactly what I had hoped it was. Here it is. I laugh openly and don't care what Mai thinks of that. I've found it. I hold it up, inspecting it closer. It's beautiful. Real gold I'm sure of it. I consider the item's past life, probably belonging to someone else, given to them by someone special. I silently thank them for it with all I'm worth. I plan to use it now that I have one. _Soon_, I promise myself.

"What the hell are you doing out here?" Mai swears exasperatedly at me as she comes up to me. She's obviously outraged I've pulled an insanely stupid stunt. I look up innocently from my kneeling position as she pulls on my arm to get back inside. Thinking in a strange combination of slow and fast intervals, I have enough sense to hide the thing. Or at least, I consider it sensible, but maybe it doesn't really matter. But I've already settled on it to be a surprise for everyone. I smile absently.

"Sorry," I mean it, Mai. I'm sorry; you didn't have to come out here. I can feel my hair pressed to my face now. I drift back into reality and feeling. I feel my _new _clothes (that Mai had found for me no less) stick to me, and my hair slip down onto my face. I swipe it back out of my eyes instinctively.

"Let's go!" Mai reminds me and pulls me completely upright and walks me in. She must think me crazy now because I haven't shown her the reason I went out there. A grin again shines on my features.

We are met with the two boys with stern faces when we reenter. I want to ask where Shizuru is, but Reito beats me to the punch, "What were you doing?" He speaks to me only and flicks his chin towards the doorway that both Tokihas have already graciously started repairing. He acts suddenly like he is in charge of this operation and I can't do what I want.

"It was nothing," I ward him off, then spill my question to know where my girlfriend is. Reito doesn't seem pleased with my short answer and doesn't respond for a moment. The new blond streak in his hair disobeying his seriousness.  
>He studies me briefly to see if anything is wrong with me. I can see that he does this out of concern and not as a controller, but I'm not in the mood to deal with anyone else at the moment. I can feel my high school-persona taking shape as my short temper builds swiftly.<p>

"Are you okay?" He asks delicately, allowing me the finalizing conclusion to his study of my current condition. A part of me snaps to not have an instantaneous answer about my girl's whereabouts. But a logical other part of me presses on to get what information I want from him. I could dart off to go find her myself, but it's a rather large building, and that's not to mention this would be obviously disruptive to the organization of the whole group. _Just give me an answer, Reito. _Because of what I've found, I'm excited to see her. I'm practically bouncing up and down.  
>"Yes, yes," I nod him on to tell me where and what Shizuru's doing to direct me.<p>

"She's laying down," He states plainly. These words click badly for me. Laying down? The words 'laying down' are not 'sleeping'. Laying down sounds more like a breather, a needed rest, an action apart from normal sleep. Laying down means slowing down. Slowing down means…. Immediately the question springs to the forefront of my mind: what's wrong? But I don't ask him that one.  
>"Why?"<br>"Headache." I hear from his tone that he is giving me the same short-answer treatment on purpose. Maybe not to get on my nerves, but to make a point. I know he cares for Shizuru too.  
>This one word is slightly relieving. This word serves to loosen my tension towards Shizuru taking a rest. A simple headache is much nicer to hear than an unidentified cause.<p>

I pocket the expensive metal (or it used to be expensive anyway) so the rest of them don't see what my hand is grasped around. It'll be a surprise. The thought of it, and my concluded decision that I _will_ ask her makes me want to giggle despite everything around me.

A headache. I'll go check on her, I think to myself. I'll go be with her. So I turn to the open doorframe, pacing around and behind the shop's checkout counter and begin to march up the stairs with a renewed determination.

The first thing I come to notice as I carefully trod up the industrious-looking cement staircase is how a lot of these upstairs floors above this shop have been burned. Once anything has been burned out, buildings and rooms being no exception, it's rendered useless. You cannot use a tool that crumbles in your hand, or eat food that disintegrates into ash in your mouth. Following this pattern of thought, one cannot live in a room that has been flame-decimated. Even in desperate times, a room littered with bricks and charcoal, and possibly with unstable structural integrity, is not a suitable living space.

So our 'scouts' have chosen the sixth floor because it is the cleanest and least burnt. When Tokyo fell, the chaotic reign of fire took over immediately. With people not at their posts and even more people "dead" ruining all civilized things, the calamity of flames broke out. A lot of fires, spreading to just about every corner of the city and beyond. No one was around to stop it, so it continued. Leaving only piles of rumble in its wake. Most buildings were affected by all of the uncontrollable burning and that has made it difficult for us survivors to live with because those areas tend to be open and unsafe. Working around the damage as best we can, we position ourselves between a stretch of apartment rooms for the night.

I find my beauty easily in the first room I check. She's already asleep, on her side, sprawled rather carelessly across an intact, clean bed. I step inside the room, tread as softly as I can to the bed, and then invite myself onto the futon next to her. I watch her delicate face and study her rising and falling chest. I don't have the heart to wake her. Such a picture of perfection should not be disturbed. Much less move her so she's laying properly on the bed, or lift her head to put a pillow underneath. I settle for leaving her as is because she's already dozing.

I wedge myself in with her sleeping form. I still want to sleep with her, in the most innocent meaning of the word. She has a headache I know. And I'm willing to comply to that and accommodate her needs. If she's tired, I won't keep her up with sex. We can sleep. Luckily, we can afford to sleep in this break in all the regular action.

It's getting later. It's dark. I think we are free to sleep now, with no more missions to being running. I don't know what time it is, but like that's ever mattered before. Sleep is important. Without it, humans couldn't go on for very long. It's all the same nightmare out there anyway, day or night.

I let my eyes close. It's okay for now. There's no rush, I think as my mind roams back to the item in my pocket. _There's no rush, Shi. We'll take our time, Shizuru. And we'll stroll through the wreckage together. We'll be together. Forever._

Then I'm back in our room. It's just as I left it. Oh, how I remember every detail of our apartment. Where all of our things are, where each loose string is on the rug, each chip on the drywall. All of our belongings in their places. The place: safe.

Shizuru is there now. We're on our bed. I remember whose side was whose, but it never really mattered. We're close to each other. After she had gotten me past my instability to have close relationships with others, it became wonderful to be able to be so near to someone else. To hold her and touch her without consequence, only happiness. I had never had anything similar to this before her…

I gradually become alert to a foreign feeling on the side of my face. A wet substance. I don't abruptly turn because a part of me already knows. I snicker and lean into her. I can also feel Shizuru's smirk at my actions as she continues to dot kisses over my ear. Purposely languidly suckling and lingering there. A shaky breath implodes into my lungs at this new intimacy.

I remember this. We had a life together before everything else. We lived together with a relationship before any of our friends did. I treasure all the downtime we once had together, when we used to purely enjoy each other's presence. Small, brief moments of affection. Moments once overlooked mean the world to me now.

After a minute of this, I twist to face her properly, then launch a real kiss. Shi moves to straddle me on the bed, pushing me down underneath her. Friction already swiftly building between us to an almost uncontainable amount.

My panting must've caught her attention because she smiles. In the same lovely way I remember. The same way from that day at Fuuka station. Then we are quickly back to kissing. I let my eyes droop closed in bliss.

But slowly after that, my lips start to register a peculiar change. There is a growing difference in my babe's lips. And I don't quite place it until I open my eyes.

Suddenly, she's one of them. Within the time my eyes were closed she's transformed. Her face. All in her face. I shiver, horrified to have such a thing laying over me. Melting. Her skin clearly _melting_.

I try to scream, being so close to this unexpected awfulness with no escape, but I find that I can't be heard. No noise erupts from my mouth.

Curiously, it opens its mouth too. Not to speak, but to bring more doom, only interested in tasting me (in a horrifyingly different way than how my girl ever wanted to _taste_ me). A gory, rotten essence escapes from inside it. I try to turn my head, but Shizuru had climbed on top of me, rendering me now unable to move away from this new creature. It's not her.

Then, surprisingly, because I thought it incapable, it utters a short stub of a sentence. A haunting final taunt spoken in a bitter scratchy tone, like a broken record, yet still somewhat retaining fragments of her true voice, "Why did you let me die?" No matter the shortness of the phrase, the content breaks my heart… something I knew as a part of me that Shizuru took control of a long time ago.  
><em>What did I do wrong? <em>I think to myself, not sure quite of what it means or where the blame should go because I don't remember…  
>Then my attitude slowly adjusts, <em>I'm so sorry babe<em>, I think to it. _I'm sorry this happened to you._

A globule of something drips onto my face from the terror simply hovering above me, imitating the moisture of her kisses. _Melting,_ I can't stop thinking it. I try to rip my face away so I don't have to look at the decaying face of my beloved. I try to push up on it, to remove this thing that is no longer my baby, but I find my limbs are not functional. No screams, no arms or legs. I'm helpless as it draws closer…

Then, a sudden _whap_ greets me. I hear my crashing, and the loudness of the sound must help startle me awake. The inexplicable sensation of being lost, yet immediately knowing what happened and where I am overcomes me. These abrupt feelings cause me to gasp in large wheezes. I allow a small cough to clear my dry throat, then bring a drowsy hand to my nose, which I must've bashed on the wooden floor.

Consequently because of the nature of the dream, I am quick to look around me. I find no straggling strangers are there to pounce on me. I breathe a bit more leisurely as I finish a complete inspection of the room.

I struggle to push myself up then because of my existing malnourished and sickened condition. I ache when I move. But I stretch when I rise to make getting up more soothing on my bruised bones. I amble back over to the couch, which I had just fallen from and climb aboard.

I become far calmer in a matter of seconds seeing that Shizuru is still asleep gracefully. She is in the same position as when I had fallen asleep cuddled next to her. That was probably a number of hours ago, judging by the shadow covering the bedroom now. Even with the windows smartly boarded securely from past occupants, there were dim rays of sunlight earlier. Now, it's much darker, so I settle again for the idea of sleep. I'll wait for her to wake up. Then… I smirk to myself.  
>I will ask her.<p>

I place a tender kiss to her cheek. I've always found it infinitely difficult to stay asleep these days, or sleep at all, while there are killers lurking outside. I don't know how she's doing it. She hasn't moved all these hours… But sleep is crucial in survival nonetheless.

After a few more moments of my attentive surveillance of her, I notice that the sound and look of her breathing seems… noticeably heavy. Abnormally labored, sending her chest in rolling, short waves.  
>But it doesn't worry me too much. It's really nothing too outlandish. We've had a rough day. That factor alone might be enough reason to force her to be mouth breathing. Nothing serious.<p>

I pull her body in closer to mine, and pass her unusual breathing off as unimportant because it'll wear off soon.

* * *

><p>It's a much different feeling to see a real person in real pain and suffering, unsure of what's happening versus being faced with the walkers. They are two completely different types of fears. The main difference being that dealing with the infested people is mostly about protecting yourself.<p>

Something like waking up to Shizuru shuddering uncontrollably and sputtering blood, that's a type of scared for someone_ else's_ life. A dreadful, horrible, frantic new type of alarm rattles my stomach, forcing me wide-awake. She had already kicked me somewhat awake, probably on accident, but now, seeing the full view of this appalling discovery, I am completely sobered.

"Shizuru!" Of course, in a world full of unreasonable, cannibalistic maniacs, there is but one simple question I need to ask her right away, "Were you bit?" I can't help but ask her it even though I recall how she was in fact previously bit. I start to wonder if the effects of her first bite have been prolonged for an extended period of time... until now. This makes me panicky. I'm not stupid enough to start with an 'are you ok?' Because, obviously she's not.

Shizuru weakly rolls again onto her side facing me, squirming on the bed in an agonizing fashion, her hands kneading open and closed in discomfort, comparable to a baby learning how to do so. She coughs relentlessly with her red eyes squeezed shut. It gradually hits me that she cannot answer me. Not with the volume of coughing she's producing. After some brief thought, I also can't imagine how to answer the question myself. Walkers have not broken in; the door or the windows would be open then. So the unpleasant reality of another type of medical emergency inks into my thoughts.

It's not just her coughing that is making the situation seem ugly, it is the blood she is spitting up with each hack, and the blood trickling out of her nose and over her upper lip. How did this happen? God, I pray I haven't spread to her whatever illness I had.

An understanding sparks me immediately to life. I know this means… but I don't want to… what it leads to… My heartbeat must be obvious because it's pounding so hard. With these elements combined, I am no longer able to wait for it to subside.

"Help! Help!" For fuck's sake, someone help her!  
>"Help!" I disregard our safety for her health. I start to blubber these cries as they become more and more interrupted by hard gulps of air I involuntarily, erratically suck in.<p>

My shouting seems to startle her more than I would have liked to. I never meant to scare her with the calls for help. I see her stunning eyes open. I can hear how she tries purposely to slow her wheezes. She doesn't want me to worry, just like all the times before this one. She wants to be the one to give all the attention to me. She doesn't want to be the difficulty; the speedbump. But that's not possible right now, Shizuru. You need care.

Since the Carnival, I've always understood this disregard she has for herself when we are put together. It has been obviously personified in this new, hurt-filled time.

But I can see it. Hiding behind the strong parent, is the frightened child gripping their hand. The fear in her eyes; the way they've widened. Because no matter what, she is scared. She is trying to make herself sturdier for me, but even she doesn't know what is wrong with herself. I have the overwhelming temptation to tell her 'it'll be okay'… because she deserves to hear it. With all she's done for me, she has not earned this kind of malicious treatment.

"Shhh, you're okay, you're okay," I wiggle myself up to the head of the futon and shakily stroke her face, not minding her blood clinging to my fingers when I touch her, but still being aware of the color. I speak as if my pleas will change things. As if telling her will fix her. How cruel it is to know the words you've spoken in efforts to soothe, are nothing but white lies. I don't want to believe it.

Responders to my shouts of help suddenly rush in, shouldering the door and obviously expecting dead invaders. Their faces drop when my sad figure and tear-trailed face looks to them, still cradling Shi's cheeks. They mutter quiet 'what's and other half finished sentences to each other, wondering what happened and what to do.

My juvenile hiccups of crying shock them, yet also stir them. Reito hurries forward, being the second closest one to Shizuru relationship-wise, behind myself.

Reito cautiously but speedily kneels next to the side of the bed closest to the door. Shi has stopped heatedly coughing and is currently struggling to whimper fleeting breaths in and out. I am on the other side of her, shivering, half on the bed and half off. Reito practically takes my place holding her face. It's when his fingers make contact with her cheek that she realizes he is next to her. Reito hesitates there, almost letting his own emotions loose at the scene in front of him. But the studious, logical part of him gets the better of him. He picks his head up to face me.

"Has she ever had a seizure before?" He examines how Shi's stomach is rolling in quivering waves from her frantic, quick breathing. I would be the one to know.

"She's not fucking epileptic!" I use an angry tone that sounds completely sure, to banish the very idea of a seizure. It can't be that. With my abrupt outburst at my answer, Reito backs off slowly. That appears to have been his only idea, besides ordering the girls to go check a vending machine they had spotted down the hall, and also to find a towel for all the blood. We will deal with like civilized people and clean her blood up.  
>They dart out of the room eagerly. I can't tell if their eagerness derives from wanting to help, or not wanting to see all of this. I stare at him for another awaiting moment, but he has no more suggestions. There is no such thing as calling an ambulance anymore. There is not much we can do, it kills me to know this information. So I ultimately go back to my babe's face.<p>

I try to keep myself from breaking completely, "Shi, I don't get it." I talk to her. I wipe the some of streaming blood from Shizuru's mouth and nose, only making smears. "What's wrong?" I speak, choked, from the back of my throat and hardly see through clear tears, needing to hear a cause, and hopefully a cure. I ask this now because her panting has slowed a bit more.

"Natsuki…" Shizuru tries to smile through bloodied lips. She pauses, having a hard time speaking, "I love you." Her words uneven, but entirely honest.

I hold my breath and search Shizuru's eyes for what this all meant, "What?" I breathe softly, unsure where Shizuru is taking this, "I-I love you too." I have to let a laugh of disbelief fizz out of my throat. Of course I love you too Shizuru, but what kind of situation is this? What is happening? Nothing is getting better. Things are going downhill faster than I could ever have imagined.

"Tsuki…" Shizuru stops and tenses, something clearly hurting and disabling her. She can't continue. Her head is shaking and I want nothing more than to ease whatever pain she is in. I cannot hear the sound of smashing somewhere in the distance. Nor do I pay attention to Mai, who races back in with a towel at this time. And then I don't mind too much as Reito takes that towel and dubs it around Shizuru's mouth.  
>I block out all other sound and senses. My vision is filled with only my girl, our eyes locked in a mute conversation.<p>

Horribly concerned, I can only hold and stroke my beloved's face. "Shizuru, hey," I try to keep her fading attention. She continues to bounce between several radical conditions within the few minutes since I've reawakened. My face can only form a pained expression, trying to hold in sobbing, because seeing all this: all the blood gurgling from the back of my dearest's throat, I understand where this was going now.

_Impossible… This is too soon. _I'm losing stability quickly. A palm on my face brings my eyes back to focus on my fallen angel's face.

With much difficulty, Shizuru strangles out, "You're home," her breath drowning in red liquid, her fragile body trembling. She says this for me and for me only. Not speaking for us, not our relationship, just me. Comforting me.  
><em>Why, Shizuru?<em>

"No, no," I murmur, holding her gaze. I have to ignore her comment for the sake of hope. I try so damn hard to deny that truth that 'you're home' is meant as last words, with a tone that seems to say 'I won't to see you again'.

I can't handle that. "No Shizuru, no. Don't make me go through this again. I'm not losing you again." I want to say more. I want to talk to her. Anything… You don't get to come into someone's life, make them care, and then just walk away!

Don't you remember coming into my life, Shizuru? How you made me believe in people again once I thought I lost it all. Don't you remember all we've been through? All we've done together? All we… Those thoughts trail off like running sand. I don't mean to blame her. I suppose I can only direct my anger towards god himself, as this is clearly an act from him. But I would venture so far as to say there's no god up there. Not any freaking more at least. He must've checked out when the infection started.

My thoughts are restless in a sluggish fashion. It takes me a moment to understand what the one idea is that is swimming at the back of my head, but I cannot quite catch it.  
>When I do remember what it was, what I want to do, I absolutely spring to life.<p>

It is now, or never.

I scramble to slide off to the side of the futon, lightly pulling Shizuru's arm with me to turn her to face me. I scurry into a formal kneel, trying my best to make it authentic. Then I look back up to her face. She looks beaten. And I'm sorry for that, Shi. Because someone should tell you they're sorry for everything you've been through and had to deal with. I'm so sorry Shi. It was never your fault. You don't deserve any of this.

We are all doing worse than ever. This is our make it or break it. There have been many who have fallen before us, and we are what is left. This is it. _This is the end._

Some would say a test like this, a trial of survival as rigorous and cruel as this; nothing good can come out of it. There is no more happiness. No more love or family. But I beg to differ. There are still some things that are forever.

I reach into my pocket, and then Shizuru suddenly understands what I'm doing. I gaze into her eyes as they widen in pure amazement. She can't very well pick herself up, but she tries nonetheless to sit up. I gently put my arm out to nudge her back down. It's okay, I nod to her.

"Shizuru," I start, unwavering. I then produce the ring I had found shimmering in the street earlier. A light in the darkness. _And this is the beginning,_ "Will you marry me?"

There is silence out of the eight of us. Everyone is back in the room again. And everyone has been stopped dead. But between Shizuru and I, it is not a bad silence. I watch in delight, with a genuine smile across my face as Shi tears up.

"Yes." She whispers. I inch myself closer and take her left hand in mine and slip the ring on her finger. I'm lucky enough that it is in fact an engagement ring, with a beautiful diamond settled atop it.

Gently pulling my cheek, Shizuru brings our faces together for what I fear will be the last time. I pull myself back onto the mattress and hold myself over my fiancé's body. I can taste the hideous copper and wish to god that I didn't. The color matches my love's eyes unspeakably well.

Then I feel the chest I'm leaning on go numb. It stalls. My stomach drops. My own chest instantly tightens. I look up immediately. It's hard to say goodbye when you know that it's over.

"Hey! No! Shi! No!" My tone can only be described as sharp panic, and it must hurt the ears of everyone else to hear it. Reito, on the opposite side, takes Shizuru's wrist.

I prop myself again onto my knees on my side of the bed and now have both hands balled into a fist on Shizuru's chest pressing for mercy. Any kind of mercy. Any relief. "Wait!" I shriek to her in a voice that's not my own.

All too quickly, she is gone. Taken from me. _Ripped_ from me. We're supposed to be married now… but it's over. I should've known from the second she found me that it was all too good to be true. And bam. That's it. We're out of the game now.

"No Shizuru! Wait! Wake up!" I can't deal with the reality of this situation any longer. I am far beyond wanting that, but am now at the turning point fiction and truth. I cannot accept that she is not okay.  
>"Natsuki." Reito means to start a sentence after he looks up from taking her pulse, "I don't-"<p>

I scream before he has a chance to finish, "You have to wake up!" I then switch back to Shizuru's mouth and try my best to bring back what I know, somewhere deep inside my lost sanity, I cannot. I can't end like this.

Prying me up from Shizuru's bloodied mouth, "God, she isn't dead!" Reito yells back, frustrated with me.

Silence. I take in that phrase for a moment, trying to process. _Not _dead?  
>Lies. He's lying! I don't know why I think of deception first; don't I want her to be alive? But I can't help but take in the sight of her lifeless body in front of me, and instinctively see that as <em>lifeless<em>.

"Shutup!" I yell at him. He's faking. He's making it up. I'm crying. I'm being loud. I squirm myself free of his grip and go back to chest compressions.

Reito might've looked confused at me then, but I don't see his face. Only her. Waiting for her eyes to open again. She will. She'll open her eyes any second.

"She still has a pulse." Reito's trying to get my attention and he succeeds. This snaps me sober.  
>"What?"<br>"Look, she's still breathing. She's just unconscious." He takes my hand and hovers it above her mouth. Sure enough, a shallow breeze escapes through her. I have the urge to give her more CPR, to re-inflate her lungs or something. I can't think of anything else useful that I can do. CPR seems to be qualified enough for an emergency situation such as this. I have the need to not stop giving her insistent care.

"Here, help me," Reito says as he grabs her arm. He has already thought of a better plan. I watch him roll her completely onto her side towards me, and then I understand what he's doing. We flip her unresponsive form onto her stomach so she is able to keep breathing. She had been gurgling up blood and lying flat like she had been, that blood would only clog her throat without the deliberate effort to remove it.

I support her shoulder from my position on the floor, cuddling into her neck. A splash of clotted red substance hits the floor with a sickening gush. I don't mean to, but I gag slightly. It pools around my knees and I imagine my jeans are soaked now. Why so much blood, Shizuru? What's wrong with you?

"Oh my god," I hear somewhere in the distance. I look up to Reito parting a bloodied patch of Shizuru's hair. I pull myself up a little to see what it is that he sees.

There is a large, ugly, deep gash at the back of her head, as if she was hit with something… I understand why we just now discover it. She was hiding it. She didn't want to worry people. No one could have ever predicted the chances would come out this badly.

"How did this…?" Reito stops there and start thinking to himself. I'm wondering if he doesn't say any more for my sake. I move my face back down to level with hers. I nuzzle my face against her impassive figure, hoping that maybe she will wake. I have a dying need to be close to her. To be touching her. To know she's with me. I want to tell her I'm sorry, and I wish that she would hear it.

I hold in a painful sob. Exactly how I remember I cried on my own. Exactly that crushing, tense feeling I always got when I was trapped and thought I'd never see daylight again. All the emotions I have now consist of those I had while I had been alone for those heartbreaking six months. Am I alone again? Have I lost you again?  
><em>Shizuru, don't leave me like this!<em>

"You can't…" I mutter, breathing hot air beside her sleeping features, with my head hunched over at her side, tucked next to her. I knew it was too good to be true. I should understand by now that in this new fucked-up world, reuniting with the one you love is too much to wish for.

…

...

"Pick up, pick up," I mutter to myself as I jog down the hallway. I pass others also running up and down this main artery hallway. A few others are on their phones too; all of us praying that the cell towers are still working.

"Pick up damn it!" My anxiety grows as the waiting tone drawls.

Suddenly, I'm met with her voice, "Shizuru!" I stop and shout, bracing myself to talk to her. But her message machine talks right through me.

"Damn it," I mutter. Then not being able to think of any other options, I dial her cell again. I anxiously start to pace back and forth a small stretch of hall. I absently gaze out the large windows that line the corridor facing the whole of the city as I wait again and again for her to answer.

There is a thin line of what looks like smoke streaming upwards from one of the lower buildings nearby. The warnings were accurate, I think as I glance down many floors below me to the rising chaos in the street. There are cars askew across the road and small outlines of people running. I don't know what to think. I've never seen this kind of mass panic before. It makes my throat a little tighter.

But certainly not as tight in the next second when an explosion rocks the building, enough to shake me to the ground.

"Natsuki?" A feminine, small voice breaks through my horrified, screaming thoughts from the device in my hand, "You there?" I had put my hands out to catch myself from the abrupt shaking and now I scramble to get my phone up next to my face again.

A few more people run by me yelling, "Yes! Shizuru!"  
>"What was that? Are you okay?" She must've heard the other workers' shouts racing by me.<br>"What?" I stutter, my eyes fuzzy, concentrating on Shizuru's image in my mind. I hobble back to the side of the window and look out as far as the glass will allow me to see if I can see what happened, "No. I mean… I mean yes. I'm fine. But there's… you remember that, uh, medical-"  
>"Slow down, slow down. I can't-" She innocently pleads with me.<br>"You remember that vaccination they were been working on that has been on the news?" I interrupt her.  
>Then give her the chance to affirm, "Yeah," Her tone says she knows nothing of what I'm about to tell her.<p>

That thought hurts me. I suddenly overwhelmed with devastating emotion. It hits me like a train. She's not with me, but I so want her to be. I need to touch her, know for sure that she's alright. I hold the bridge of my nose, unable to respond right away.

"Natsuki?" She calls out, not sure of anything.  
>"Yes." I re-greet her, holding back all tonal symptoms that I am breaking down. To handle it, I draw in a large breath through my nose. I want her to be safe.<p>

"Shi, listen to me. Listen to me." I try to breathe. "You're at home, right?"  
>"Yes. I didn't have to go in today." She tells me in a manner that says I already should've known this fact.<br>"Okay. Okay." I repeat words because I can't think straight enough to speak fast enough to produce new ones, "I need you to do something. I need you to grab all of the clothes and food and water bottles you can. Right now."

"What? Why? What about the vaccination?" I've skillfully confused her now and it's not that I don't have the patience to explain things, it's that we are running out of time.  
>"It's not working," I sum up the general outline of the medical story.<br>"What do you mean?" She tries again.  
>"Please Shi…" I do my best to hold back any tears at the thought of what could happen. "They've ordered evacuations. I need you to just get everything, and… and… meet me at the train station. Please. It's really important. There isn't a lot of time."<p>

"Natsuki," I'm scaring her; it's upsetting to hear my name moaned in such a way, "Can't you explain a little. I don't-"  
>"I know, I know. I'm so sorry, babe. I'm really sorry. I really don't know much either." I give her my actual knowledge of the situation "But you will, right? You'll meet me?" I dearly wish I could see her face.<br>I wait for her to accept my franticness.

"Yes."

...

...

It's surreal. It's really surreal. And surreal is the best and only way to describe it.

"Natsuki?" My name suddenly breaks the silence. I don't move. I haven't moved in hours. I can feel that need to stretch my muscles from being sat in one position for so long. I don't care.

"Natsuki? Can we talk?" Reito comes closer, repeating my name, seating himself near me. Shi has worried all of us. But it's been a while, and I guess at this point, that I might be the one worrying the rest of them because of my behavior. I haven't moved in hours.

He readjusts himself. I do not look elsewhere from Shizuru. She'll open her eyes about now. There is bitter sunlight beginning to flood through the spaces between the boarded windows. It's morning now._ It's morning now, Shizuru. Time for you to wake up._ I was always the early-riser when we lived together, despite all of our friends believing the contrary. I was used to getting up early because of my 'old life' in spywork and such. A certain paranoia (nowhere close to what I have now) always irked me in sleep, even at our secure apartment. Even when all the work was done. Even when there was nothing left to be afraid of.

But somehow, I find myself easily able to communicate, although I had thought it would be harder to release words from my throat. There's no reason I can't talk to them. I don't need to be a dark figure now, right? I can talk.  
>"About what?"<br>"Well…" I think he scratches his head, but I only see out of my peripherals. His motion is one of anxiety, trying to stall the bringing around of something unfortunate, something I won't want to hear.  
>"Well?" I press. The sensation of urgency builds inside of me.<p>

"Natsuki, I'm not sure she will wake up." All at once. He speaks all the bad news all at once. No. That can't be right. I'm sure she will wake up. I'm sure she'll wake up now. It's morning now. I'll wake her up like I used to. She's just sleeping. Why not? We're all tired… I'm tired…

I don't respond. I think that makes Reito more on edge. Is it me that is making all of you on edge? Why? I'm just waiting. We've just been waiting one night.

"Natsuki, there's something else." He continues. This is where I break my stare towards my girl's face and look around the room. I find my best friend's face, molded in concern. I see all of their faces for the first time in hours, although they've been here the whole time. It occurs to me how beaten they look as well. We are all crushed. But are they crushed from Shizuru blacking out?

"Ok," I push Reito on.  
>"She hasn't woken up…" He exhales, " So I'm thinking…" He is certainly taking his sweet time getting to the point. I stare at him seriously.<p>

"She's not one of them," I inform all of them firmly. "If that's what you're thinking-"  
>"I wasn't going to say that," He corrects.<br>"What then?"

"You remember when both of you were in the water this morning?"  
>"Yes."<br>"You remember how she hit her head on the ledge?"  
>"Kind of."<p>

"I think that's gotten to her,"  
>"Gotten to her?"<br>"She is probably now under the effects of trauma to the head."  
>"Meaning?"<br>"Her brain took her conscious self out of the picture, Natsuki… I think," He stops to take a deep breath, "it might've put her in a coma," Reito breaks the information he knows to me… And what does he know! She's just asleep. She just needs a splash of ice water.

Somehow, I hear myself speaking without my command to do so, "No way. No way..."  
>"That's what it looks like," He justifies, "It's been more than six hours," As if he's some medical professional! Coma my ass! "We could keep watching, but I don't know," He trails off in a 'sorry'.<p>

"No Shi, wake up. Wake up."

"Natsuki…" Another voice calmly approaches from behind me.

"No! Wake up! Wake up!" I'm past hysterics, shaking my beloved's shoulders in desperation. So I feel a hand cover my mouth. With a firm grip over my mouth, I'm pulled backwards, away from my comatose love. My breath puffs against the hand, still stressfully mouth-breathing.

"Enough, Natsuki!" Mai struggles to quiet me, holding me back. I'm both reaching back to the bed and also trying to remove the hand over my mouth. I only get squished 'mmph's out. Mai drags me to sit with her, away from Shizuru. I watch the no-longer-glowing angelic body intently, once again waiting for any kind of movement.

Time passes but I am unaware how much. Eventually, I begin to slow. My hand picking at Mai's across my shoulders winds down to a prickle, barely fighting her anymore.  
>She lets go then.<p>

"Doesn't she need life-support then?" I ask Reito with an urgent tone, somewhat accepting his coma theory. He is standing, also watching Shizuru, but with a different, more scholarly stance. His arms are crossed. Reito is also crumpled from this loss, I know, but has more focus and less afflicting emotions than me.

"Why hasn't anything happened until now then?" I ask angrily, wishing nothing at all had come from that hit.  
>"Maybe it was delayed..."<p>

Nobody is helping her. I crawl back to her, once Mai has released me.  
><em>What has the world done to you… to us, Shizuru?<em>

"Doesn't she need help?" I continue angrily, though I'm not sure where to direct this anger. Every violent and forlorn word I say feels not my own. I feel like I'm watching this scene from a distance. I'm not here. This isn't really happening. "I don't…" Get it, I want to say. I want to tell her that I don't understand this and then I want her to wake up and correct it for me. I want her to be here with me.

"What life-support can we offer, Natsuki?" A brutal sentence. The helpless alone feeling sinks in again. Even in a safe room surrounded by other people, that rather familiar sickened fear engulfs me.

"Can you hear me, Shi?" I inch closer to her, whispering in her ear. I wait with more frozen patience then I knew I had. Any movement. I really dearly want to comb through her hair, but the thought of a head injury that Reito suggested stops me.

"So it's my fault?" I start, still staying close to my fiancé, but looking up for answers at the rest of the crew. "She saved me." Always doing things for me, never herself.

Then Nao weighs in, with a small speech I wasn't expecting from her. "She knew what she was doing. She knew the risks. She wanted you to live Natsuki. All the time. She really loved you." But then she ends with something that catches me off guard. "Don't disappoint her."

I start to build on this idea of living up to Shizuru's expectations. Or, maybe not her expectations, but her wants and goals for my life. I suppose that I owe her that much. After she has always done so damn much for me.

Now it's my chance to do something for her. _Don't worry Shi. The fallen pieces of our broken world are coming back together now, I promise you. I will take care of you, _I swear to her, with my hand over her heart, measuring her still beating, yet empty pulse beneath it.

I find it extremely difficult to pick up her comatose form with my fading strength and her unconsciousness therefore her inability to hold herself upright as I hold her. It takes me a minute and no one says anything to stop me in that minute.

I know what I need to do. I carry her bridal style, like a new fiancé should, to the door, with the others watching us curiously.

She needs help. We need to move on. I know my role now, what I am meant to do. I will do anything, and I will do it all.

With Shizuru held in my bare arms, and me trying my best to support her fragile, unstable head, I announce, "We're going,"

* * *

><p>Let me know what you guys are getting from this. I know that my work makes sense to my eyes. But please, leave me a message to tell me what you readers think. It's difficult for me to tell on my own. Love to hear it, but leave flames the door.<p>

You can also always check out my profile for updates on how each chapter is coming along.


	9. Reaching

**Fallen ~**

Whew, it's been a while. But I must have something to give you guys from the past couple months, so here take this.

On another note, I'm hearing that it's sounding like more of a downer now. But I promise that it is darkest just before the dawn.

**Chapter Nine**

**Reaching ~**

No… that's too much… That's too much to_ assume_. I don't think that's correct.

One cannot simply judge an unconscious person to be comatose after such a short amount of time. It doesn't work like that! She cannot simply be dubbed to be 'in a coma' all at once. That's just stupid. I mean, what medical staff do we have around to say such a thing?

I hear Mai's voice traveling closer from behind me. I don't turn. I continue to walk down the corridor, my wife heavily limp in my arms. I can feel tears on my face; small hot droplets emerging from my eyes get colder as they run down my face, making my cheeks itch. Everything is cold but I am the image of calm and contained. Things are falling around me, but I am anything but frantic. The only thing I can feel is the deadweight in my arms. I struggle to keep Shizuru from sliding off my arms. With zero conscious effort to keep herself attached to me, and me in my withered, malnourished state, I find myself numbly stumbling under the full weight of another person.

"Stop! Stop…" Mai pants, taking hold of my shoulder beside me and forcibly turning me with an obvious, gentle pity to her touch. I have to step backwards, catching myself as the force of her grabbing me catches me off guard. I manage to shiver her off without shaking Shizuru too much. Mai understands, but doesn't leave. I stop but don't turn.

"Where…?" She asks softly, I want to shrug her away. What a stupid question. I breathe heavily, shuddering breaths after breaths out through my nose, adrenaline coursing through my system, so much that I can barely keep my cool, but at the same time, am entirely controlled.

I stare at the boarded doorway suddenly in front of us for a moment. An even more quaking breath wracks through my abdomen, paining my stomach, but my pride forbids me from giving off any sign of weakening. I hold my baby as resolute as ever, feeling the slow soreness strike me, and I'm breathing as though I've just run a marathon. I slowly face her and out of the corner of my eye, and I can see the others silently stream out of the room, wondering what's next.

A strong voice suddenly booms out of the quiet doorway. Through my distance trance, my developed instinct make me cringe at the volume, "You can't take her anywhere!" Reito's square figure marches at me in aggravated strides. He makes his move, reaching with both arms to take the body from me.

"I have to!" I rip away from him, swiveling around, when he reaches for my girl in my arms. The combined forces of Shizuru's weight on me, my sickly condition, and my fear at her sudden loss of consciousness make me horribly wobbly from the burden, buzzing as if I just had a load of energy drinks. Reito makes this ten times worse as he tries to take the figure out of my arms again, plainly seeing how I cannot handle it.

"No!" I defend, yanking the fair-haired babe strewn over my arms around out of his reach like a cowering animal, nearly falling down myself.

"Stop fucking shaking her!" He orders and is able to take her from me at that point, as his sentence stops me. The difference is clear between the two of us once she is in his arms: how unstable I have become. "God Natsuki…" I am accused, making me seem even more mentally unhinged. My current profound look of shock and confusion then melts into pure misery.

I sink to my knees and Mai comes to sympathetically attend to me, "Give her back… give her back… I need her…" I ask quietly, my muddy face watering up. He doesn't, and I have my best friend wiping the grime off my face for me as he turns and starts carrying Shizuru back to the apartment bedroom. I watch stricken, as her unsupported head hangs limply over Reito's grasp. Her flaxen hair drifting as if underwater…

"Chie!" Nao whispers, elbowing the other quiet girl, then points to the door. Her hissed comment grabs all of our attention. But even more grabbing is the sound of a tumbling box from behind us in the blockaded doorway.

From our kneeling positions, Mai and I whip around to look for the source. There is a deep, muffled exhale. We're able to see a single flaking, pale hand climbing through the rumble. We jump up away from it while the ever-unshakable Nao clips the hammer of her handgun into place, promptly followed by the levelheaded Chie.

The three outstretched fingers, and the stubs of two others have caked blood still smeared on them in the same streak marks where one would wipe it from their face. A faint reminder that they too were once alive. That they too once went through hardships and bled, and cried, just like us.

Nao does a double take and jump-starts her jog to us, hopping backwards. She waves her arms in an arc to us, passing us, "Look for another exit." A moan follows her command from behind the barricade, and I shiver. That gets us up and going in an instant, with Chie herding. Nao taps Reito's shoulder, who is almost back into the room and briefly explains what's down the hallway.

"We're not going to move Shizuru anywhere." He argues, carefully eyeing me as the rest of us catch up. "And I don't think Natsuki should go anywhere either," He grounds me, rambling a short list of my own current limitations, with the whole river incident…

"We're not guna stay here," Nao says strictly, stressing _not _and _stay here_. There is a moment of silence while Reito studies the solemn, stern redhead, only interrupted by slams of the corpse's body against the other side of our stacked boxes.

Nao tilts her head to the side nonchalantly, speaking her opinion before Reito replies, "I don't give a fuck what happens to the fag," She says so directly and casually, nodding the frail body being held. She is ready to run out on all of us.

"Don't call her that!" I lash out, stepping closer only to have Reito pull Shizuru further away from me as if a child protecting a precious toy. _Mine. _I stop myself without having to be held back by others.

"Let Natsuki carry her," Nao continues to Reito, appearing completely unfazed by the dire situation in front of her, brainstorming offhandedly. Even though the remark is unfeeling, the significance that Nao did not say to simply leave Shizuru here, with some horrible survival-of-the-fittest statement, strikes me.

And at my reference, I perk up, nodding my assent. Nao's second comment relates to what Reito had said about not being able to_ take_ her. But her proposal misses the mark, switching the meaning of 'we can't move her' to 'I can't carry her'.

Reito doesn't understand as well, "You're not hearing me," Reito spits angrily, "She cannot be_ taken_ anywhere. She has a head injury." He makes the final conclusion, saying it is a head injury. I try to walk forward again. Upon seeing this action from me, in a lower voice he tells me, "She's my friend too Natsuki-san." He adds an insensitive san suffix to push me away verbally.

Feeling the need to contribute his ideas, Mai's brother speaks up, "We could take her somewhere safer, then let her rest there," Takumi puts delicately to please everyone. The tumble of furniture forces Reito's decision to be now.

"That will just make it worse!" He counters.

"They've heard us, we can't just sit here," Mai yell-whispers, eyebrows irritably pinned together, bending closer into the conversation circle to be heard.

"We could stay here, there's only one over there!" Reito flicks his chin back to the boarded staircase.

"You don't know that," Nao inserts trickily, arms crossed.

"It sounds that way..." He says to support his claim.

We are left to silence, waiting through Reito's moment of deliberation, "Fine... No shooting," The black-haired man sighs, "We look for another room," He gives in.

"Upstairs or downstairs?"

Nao answers her hastily, "Down," Knowing we would just get cut-off if we went up.

With that, we start trudging down the hall. We move slowly for a number of reasons. The number one being mine and Reito's touchiness at the correct care for Shizuru. Another reason being obviously for the sake of looking out. My impulsive nature urges me to run around these building corridors just to get out faster, into a more visible open space. I don't like these blind turns and tight walls. But with the group, I am slowed considerably. We have less speed so not to lose each other.

The others, surprisingly including Mai and Takumi, have their guns rigidly pointing in the aim of their line-of-sights, but I don't take mine out yet. I continue to pet-whisper to Shizuru, crouching while walking next to her drooping figure. I take the liberty of holding her head up because it is falling off Reito's inconsiderate arms. I also berate Reito with feeble punches and pleads for me to be the one to take care of her. I stick to his side as he follows the others. I tell him again and again that I'll take her, that I want to carry her. He doesn't do anything.

After these few minutes of walking, I've had enough. I don't care where we go, but I need my girl. _Why won't you wake up Shizuru? Goddamn it, why not…?_

I sweep my arm over a lamp table, flinging it's contents to the carpet. I thoroughly enjoy the crash and shatter of an ornamental lamp. This noise derails the train of our group. They all turn backward to me standing determinedly upright, my hands bravely at my sides, my face twisted in the harshest tangle of emotions, leaving me with a deadpan, but angry expression.

There is a standoff: me against the rest of the world. I stare fearlessly into the slightly stunned eyes of everyone.

"She's my wife," They have already forgot I married her a few hours ago. Reito looks up, remembering this.

Nao makes an unimpressed face, "Nobody married you, dumbass."  
>"Nevermind that!"<br>"So it's not really official." She shrugs.  
>"Would you shutup!"<br>"She can be your fiancé," All of them nod, suddenly each having a composed, real world input on the matter.  
>"You know what I mean!" I tell all of them.<br>"K," The girls agree to let it go, shrugging like normal people who hadn't just been running from the undead.

I take a deep breath, once again regaining my seriousness, "Please..." I look to the man already poorly cradling her, "I would like to hold her myself." I suck in a sniff through my runny nose in the cold air.

Gradually, Reito draws near me. After what feels like forever, he is in front of me. My vision blinks and I look down; I'm holding her again. I have her. Slid into my outstretched arms, one hand under her knees and another under her back, Reito positions her head on my shoulder. My doll Shizuru.

Glancing back up at his solemn, dark face, I stare wide-eyed that she came back to me so easily. It takes me a good amount of time to comprehend. Mouthing a thank you, he nods and starts to walk again.

She is less heavy now. I lean down and hover above her sleeping features, lightly dotting a few kisses around her pale face. I have no free hands to do anything else. Including holding a gun. So Mai accompanies me in the back of our line, pushing on my back, guiding my over-exhausted mind.

I am therefore preoccupied when a hollow metal clang on tile floor in front of us catches our ears. A lopsided, gaping jaw lunges at Nao. A high-pitched scream erupts from her as she trips backwards, finding no footing in space.

I look up from my girl's face and see Nao on her back on the ground. I watch, suspended, as she draws her gun and fires a shot. And another. She fires straight up at the surprise figure lurching over her, causing it to deadly tumble forward once it has new gashes angled upwards through it's cheekbone, the bone itself spit out of the easily-damageable diseased skin. Another jerky shriek of disgust comes from Nao as she scrambles from underneath the figure tremendously roughly, but gets nowhere. Finally someone is able to dive in to help her because the threat is eliminated. Takumi helps her up and she shakes like a dog once she's up.

"Fuck!" She stammers, more shakily than I've ever seen her as she waves her arms like a bird. But of course soon enough, true to her aggressive cheeky character, she struts back up to the thing and kicks it with all the force she has. We all stand still, not willing to stop her as she steps on the ragged person with vengeful kick after kick, muttering profanities at it all the way.

I let my legs unconsciously take me closer, moving in past Chie and the guys. Nao gives it one last boot then turns, panting, to me. She quirks an eyebrow, silently asking what I need, _what's new Kuga?_ I'm watching the carcass with a never-ending disbelief at the sight. I glance around searching for where it came from. A few splayed pipes lie across the hallway, sprouting out of an opened closet door nestled in a blind spot around the next corner of a branching corridor.

The fiery red head dismisses the scene like it never happened, taking up position with her gun and strolling forward.

However, this moment of serene aftershock is short lived. The next second explodes in more animation, springing from behind.

A monstrous figure latches onto Reito's arm, lifting his arm to its face. The teeth bared from the horror are red and rotted, as is the skin: un-taken-care-of. Reito spends a good amount of time trying to bring his shoulders forward, away from the beast, but the one-track-minded beast stays where it is. We cannot fire in fear that we will miss its head and hit Reito.

Someone shrieks when they notice the rest of the company of hunched, irregular figures approaching down the hall we just came from. All thoughts escape me and the adrenaline starts pumping again. I feel my anxiety skyrocket and I become paranoid with the _fear. _I almost drop Shizuru, but end up clawing nervously into her body. I scan the surroundings for a way out.

Breaking free from the hold of surprise, Nao is able to take a glance down the path around the next bend. She turns back to us and shakes her head. I glimpse into the hallway opening the last walker sprang from, and see it is made up of only a closet and fire kit. Both dead ends. There is a group realization that we are cornered. The whole floor is a snake, with one staircase. Somewhat typical of apartments stacked on top of each other in a populated area with limited ground space to place a stairwell down to the roadside. We only went deeper. The only thinkable ways out are where the zombies are.

"Run!" Reito yells, still struggling.

"There's nowhere!" Mai's brother shouts back, asking for suggestions.

I watch the black-haired man's eyes bulge as the rancid arm around his neck cleverly tightens, "The rooms," He squeaks out in a short breath. We don't move right away, not wanting to leave because… because what would happen to him?

"Now!" He enforces. Even though he is completely restrained and cannot force us to move, we start to follow Reito's powerful words like obedient puppies, slowly trudging backward. Like a gentleman, Takumi gives a faint bow thankfully and then ushers his sister and Chie into the first room he can, shutting the wooden door as Mai tries to struggle against this plan. Nao and I, holding Shizuru, stand against the opposite wall and we will have to find a different hiding spot.

"You have Shizuru," The dark-haired man in front of the oncoming crowd yells to me, seemingly double-checking. But his phrase unknowingly provides me with both a measure of strength, and finally his consent. I will have to be the one to take care of her now. He will not have us waiting for him. These are his orders for us to get out of here while we still can. I nod to him.

Nao makes no motion of moving, stuck in place watching the deformed figures. So I'm quick to take a deep breath, _I can do this, _and drop Shi's legs so I have a free hand, then pull Nao with us around the corner, where other corpse just came from.

Thinking quickly and gathering all the muscle he can as the hungry swarm is about to descend on our hideouts, Reito pulls the bulky walker's arm suddenly forward over his shoulder and then uses its own momentum to rock it backwards and off its feet. I don't see the rest of what he does as I shove Nao and Shi into the closet the walker that just attacked was in. But soon I hear the slam of a new door further down the hall. Maybe he's safe…

The closet is small, squished and reeks of acrid, wet decay. There are even still dripping smudges of some sort of bodily fluids around the walls, as if the zombie had been knocking itself around the inside of here. The sharp smell makes Nao sputter a cry. I swiftly slap a hand down over her mouth and pull her down to the floor with me. We land on some janitorial tools, sending them crashing into the back wall with a thud. I am able to close the door, pulling inwards on the slats in the door with the tips of my fingers.

We know how they sense us. None of their human senses have gone away. Some have 'decayed', per say, after the long, contagious summer of hell and heat, but they can do what we can, for the most part. Their skin does not change color, like in the movies. They are not green; they are pale, sickly and more red if anything, because of all the blood. Some of them walk without the limps, and have very few or invisible bite marks. Sometimes, they are mistakable for real people.

I try sitting back and letting the waiting commence, but I quickly learn that the recent inhabitant of this closet had broken the handle in their struggle to get out. The door swings back open once I let go of it, without any latch to hold it in. The hinges are busted, the metal bent outwards from the body bursting out. Nao and I sit in sudden insecure shock. The door opens to our right, exposing us to the hall on our left.

I watch horrified as the first straggler limps by, and now we're right in the open. The panic freezes us. We don't have the courage to reach into the open abyss in front of the killer walking blindly by. One by one becomes two by two and soon three by three. All drawn here from my earlier noisy dispute and the gunshots. And still, we don't act. We only hold our breath. Or, I hold both of ours with my hand still clasped over Nao's mouth. I keep her mouth covered forcefully and she puts up no fight against it. I can feel the short, frightened puffs of air from her nose on my hand.

A solid streak of dark silver on the floor catches my eye as I let my head droop from the ache of bad luck. It's a pipe that had toppled out of this supply closet when the previous occupant tumbled out. In a glance down at Shizuru's sleeping face, my mind decides to do what needs to be done. Moving in semi-conscious decision, I reach for the pipe. The curved end serving perfectly for hooking around the edge of the door so I don't have to lean all the way out into harm's way. But, this is not a fair game.

Small creaks sound from the door, and clinks echo from the pipe touching the door. It is enough in the dead silence of feet padding by. I stop, cringing. A half-human head lolls around to face the noise. The clouds in the woman's pupils flit toward us. Dull eyes nearly trick us into believing they have not become an animal. She displays no clear severe wounds. She almost looks like one of us… But her appearance screams lies.

With a struggling on one of her feet, she charges at our hideout, no longer safe, with choppy growls. Quicker than I can control, Nao and I shriek in short, shattered words.

"Close it! Close it!" Nao tearfully pleads through clamped teeth, her voice so much higher. I don't have the immediate bravery to reach out of our comfort zone and grab the door, so I try with the pipe edge first again. But I'm not fast enough. The face of the woman is already crouched down and entering our atmosphere, mouth first.

We continue to scream, and this attracts more attention. Within a minute's time we have three of them tromping closer and the one at our doorstep.

"Godamn motherfucker!" Nao inserts profanities between pure screams. We hold the initial trespasser out with our legs, having to tip ourselves onto our backs to kick it out. I have crumpled back into Shi's body, which I have carefully protected behind me. The unfairness of her situation brings anger to my chest. What can she do to protect herself here? My throat tightens. And I feel a pulse of revenge flow through me.

With others fast approaching because of our action and noise, I hastily hurl a vengeful kick to nearest one's neck. The thing doesn't have enough strength to keep itself upright; it tumbles backwards at the force.

Nao and I don't need to talk to convey the next necessary acts. I manage to grab the slanted slats in the door by jamming my fingers down into the wood, and I lean back and swing the door closed just as Nao jabs away another figure with the pipe.

I allow myself to scramble backwards once Nao has the door handle secure. I find immediate comfort in my girl, pulling her inanimate torso up to be nearer to me.

Our break in 'immediate threats' is short lived. A bashing against the outside of the door makes us instinctively cry out. The darkness of closet adds to all the unknown fear, shadows of the walkers cast upon the sideways planks of the closet door. Nao continues to hold onto the door handle, pulling to hold in the broken hinges, seemingly regardless of the killers scratching just a little bit away.

I exhale, trying to drown out the sound of their breathing and groaning, and close my eyes briefly. I will take care of you Shi. I promise.

Some time must pass like this, with us quietly suffering in short, sweet whimpers. I am too shattered to wipe away my tears or runny nose. We sit and shiver with the people heaving themselves at our door, until a shout echoes from somewhere nearby.

The sick people don't speak… it can only mean that it's one of us.

It's distinctly a deep masculine cry. His words are garbled to our ears and high-pitched. It makes our pulses race. I squeeze my baby tighter. There is a shatter of splintering wood and more screaming. Nao's eyes are wide and she manages to turn to me, despite the commanding presence of crazed people just inches from us. I know what she's asking. What do we do now?

'What _do _we do now?' I think to myself. But I am halted by the sounds of firearms. We jolt after each shot for three shots. The whining stops then. Nao and I can't move, we are stunned. But our attackers can, and they are now more interested in the explosive noises than us and start to pull themselves away.

I find myself lost in a drowning pit of emotions and thoughts. What do we do next? Where do we go? Are they gone? And mostly, who was shooting? Who's hurt? I tumble lifelessly through a thousand different fearful questions and ultimately sit inside the closet dumbly staring into space. One question stands out from the rest. What do we do? The screams must've been from one of our own and that idea alone sparks a hideous dread that makes us want to stay in our little sanctuary. It's a cruel thought, completely selfish, but what more can I demand from my fatigued body and mind? I still have an unconscious Shizuru to protect.

I want to stay here, but my morals want me to act. We need to help. I can't help but need to oblige this tugging feeling in my chest. I would never let myself live it down if I lost a survivor, a friend, from my own group. I look to Nao, who is dazed, but she seems to feel the same. Torn.

Grabbing both girls with a rush of strength, I stand and let the door swing open and we are left exposed again. A few stragglers turn and I think I might have a heart attack. I quickly push Shizuru into Nao's unhappy but resourceful arms, and reach for the pipe, but a new weapon catches my eye.

I turn around and struggle to unhinge the fire extinguisher out of the fire kit behind the closet door. Out of my peripherals, I watch this walker get closer and closer. I scramble to release the tubing from the side. I steal brisk glances between the machinery piece and our attackers. They swing their arms at us, and Nao and I begin to back against the wall, watching this in slow horror.

"Natsuki!" Nao alerts me to how close the nearest one is. I forget trying to unlock the extinguisher's primary function, and eventually raise the red can at the call and hit the first walker in the face, swinging the heavy tool around to smash into it's head, narrowly avoiding hitting Nao. For the next one I manage to unhook the pipe-line and squeeze down the handle. I smile in disbelief, with a little twinkle of joy, as a foam coats the person and forces them back. _Fun, weird._ It hits me how I wouldn't be able to do this if it were not the cannibal apocalypse. _Cool,_ I shrug.

_Quick, quick, we must be quick._ Echoes across my mind. No time to lose. Nao adjusts herself, mentally dusting herself off. I pull her with me to the hallway, swiftly taking back the blonde into my arms. We proceed carefully, keeping our ears peeled.

And soon enough, around the next turn, we find that the walkers have not entirely left yet. Fragile but gruesome sighs resonate from just around the next bend. We've found them and placed ourselves, once again, in a lovely precarious situation. Peeking around the corner, we try to quiet our breathing. I'm surprised to see that they're not all over something dead on the ground. There's nothing. Whoever must've screamed must be one of the rooms. The walkers are gathered around one particular doorway so that's probably it.

We need to go there. If anything, we need to meet up with our people again. That's what's next. There is a moment of understanding between Nao and I, and we nod briefly.

The first few shots I take miss, or rather, miss vital organs that would take these people down. Springing out into the middle of the hall, we attract immediate attention from the beasts, the shredded faces turn towards us. I try to dismiss the insanity of the situation. I'm hitting people with bullets and they are unfeeling. They do not react. Their faces unaltered and dead, not distressed in any sort of pain. _This _is why we call them dead. It makes me shudder and I wonder why we ever left the closet.

The moment of contemplation leaves me slowly, and I let them get closer to me as I fumble for the trigger. This is not our smartest idea, to shoot into a crowd in a closed space. But that door… that's where we need to go. Where else? What else? Besides, I'm too damn jumpy to stay put. I can already sense the security we'll have in there.

We manage to hit a few more, as I balance my babe with one arm. Nao then leads the way bravely into the rest left standing, kicking them down so they are left rolling on the floor. We hurry through them and I can't help but marvel at the lunacy of these people all on the ground.

"Natsuki!" Nao waves an arm as she's standing with the door open now. Mai's brother stands beyond her, holding the door. I see further into the room to the others.

It takes me a second to digest this, _we did it_. Through all stupid odds, again and again, we are alive.

I tow my girl into the room and with a trusting attitude and a coaxing atmosphere, I lay her down on the wood floor, not needing any more dramatic protection in here. The door is shut behind us, with two people leaning against it, and I scan the room. The blood pumping in my ears must've blocked out the elephant in the room, but now I am aware and I timidly crawl to the huddle nearby.

Violently, my head shrieks no way, no way.

Moaning and groaning flat on his back is the man who just saved our lives.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: **You know what I like? You guys. You know what I like more? Reviews. From you guys. This is all for you.

I think I'm going to need a beta.


	10. Obstacles

**Fallen ~**

ugh im late again. sorry. But I pulled an all-nighter for this! Happy birthday Natsuki!

Buuut…. To my readers! I fucking love you and your reviews are my motivator! So please keep them coming!

**Chapter 10**

"The more you are motivated by love, the more fearless & free your action will be." – 14th Dalai Lama

**Obstacles ~**

"No." I scowl at them and hug the limp body closer to me.

"Natsuki," They drone. "This is the only way." It doesn't matter what I say now anyway. They're already making preparations. They're found bed sheets, and are tying them together.

On my own, I would have been willing to pull a trick like this, but not with my unconscious Shizuru. I hold her against me tightly so they don't take her.

There are still fingernails grating on the outside of the door even after all these hours. It's clear that they aren't going away. A group of us is too appealing to leave alone.

I glance once more at the open window and take a deep breath. Tactically, I agree with them. It is the only way out. But this type of exit requires able bodies, strength and skill. And we are just drained on manpower.

I softly stroke my beloved's face, in efforts that the touch will wake her up. Now, if anytime, is the time I need you to be awake, Shizuru. But her eyes remain closed, her breathing doesn't change and there is still no reaction from her. I allow myself a deep exhale of disappointment and I lean my head back.

When I look back into the room, the group is hunched over the window. Chie has gone out first, as a scout, while the others stand and watch her climb down to the courtyard below.

I turn my attention to the man next to me. He is nearly asleep. And my breathing becomes uneasy as I try to stutter a, "I'm sorry."

"What for?" Reito asks, eyes still closed, hand still clutching his wound.

"For earlier." I say bluntly. Underneath the words, I know I'm asking for forgiveness from him for my unnecessary fit. I know now that he was just trying to help.

He leisurely flashes a rare grin through his pain, and readjusts his shoulders against the door.

"I understand. It's okay Natsuki-chan." And just like that he gives me closure on all of my psychologically unstable offenses. I'm a little surprised at his amnesty. Then he adds, "Shizuru is really very lucky to have someone like you." To have someone like _me_…

I quickly come up with an excuse, "She has already saved my life before, so I'm just returning-"

"You're returning nothing. You are making your own decisions." He pauses, "You're very passionate. You love her." He notes, and I feel a blush. "And that's also what makes your head as hard as a rock," Reito finally opens his eyes and turns to me.

"Mai would know too," I mutter. He laughs.

"You're a good person Natsuki. I respect that." I give myself a few seconds to turn his sentence over in my head, then bashfully nod. I'm given a serious nod in return and then the rest of the group marches over to us.

"Ok," They say to me. I know what it means. Mai offers a hand down to me and I decidedly take it. Then, I pick Shizuru up like the fragile doll she is. Painfully, I make my way over to the window, hauling her beautiful, sedated body into my arms.

I sit her down in front of the window and look over the broken glass to see Chie waiting 6 stories below. There are no walkers near her. This is our chance. We argue about which way to tie Shizuru, but eventually settle on making an X around her shoulders and torso.

The moment of truth arrives quicker than I expected. I stall by anxiously pacing around, checking all of our knots, making everything tighter. My heartbeat has heightened, and I have a nasty feeling in my chest. Everything about this idea strikes me as stupid and bad.

They're looking at me, waiting for me, waiting for my approval. I wander back to check my girl's homemade harness. It doesn't quite please me, but any alternatives are worse. We're out of exits, we're out of options, and we're about to be out of time.

"Kuga." I'm brought back down to earth. "It's now or never." Nao crosses her arms. My throat constricts in frustration. I can't speak. My instincts won't permit me to tell them to do it, so I grab the fabric cable instead. They understand what this means.

The three left available in the room, grip the line as well. They stand further back to feed me the line slowly. Carefully, I push Zuru's legs outside the window, and we all hold onto the slack tightly. Finally, I let her body drop out the window.

And then we start to lower her. I stand back to help let her down gradually. I cautiously watch our homemade line slip by over the edge, knot by knot. A wave of relief washes over me as I believe the hard part is over. Little did I know, the worst had yet to come.

The first thing I recognize is looseness. The second thing I notice is the sudden increase in the speed of the rope sliding through my hands. My brain couldn't have processed the situation any faster, allowed me to react any faster than I did. At first, I make the mistake of looking behind me to see what happened. But too soon the end of the cord is through my fingers, and I am just standing there.

My eyes widen as I realize what has happened. "Shizuru!"

In an instant, I fly to the window, hurling myself at the last inch of unknotted rope slithering across the floor. I land on my knees and I form a secure fist around the line faster than I have before. Her weight at the other end and my powerful will not to let go, however, smashes me into the windowsill before pulling me upright and nearly out the window.

I'm on my stomach hanging out the window by the time someone has my legs. We've finally stopped moving and there's multiple bodies flung on top of me.

I try to awkwardly twist upwards to face them, "Which one of you morons tied this?" My tone allows them to laugh at it, but only because nobody died from this slip-up. I can tell they are struggling under our weight. I can feel the blood start to flow to my head and it feels like gravity is increasing on me. I try to stretch out my other arm to reach the rope, but can't twist my shoulder enough to accomplish this with the weight on the rope.

"Guys, I can't hold this." I ask for help through gritted teeth. This is straining my arm to the limit. The only thing separating my oblivious babe from the ground is the feeble grip of my right hand. The cold wind doesn't help as it bites my rigid fist. I pathetically try to haul my arm up so I can get two hands on this blanket rope. But it's like weightlifting and I just don't have to biceps to do this one handed.

I squirm I my friends' hold again, "What're you waiting for? Pull me in!" I growl heavily, looking at them upsidedown. They're grabbing at my jeans, all trying to get my body back in. But it's clear they're having hard time doing so with their emaciated bodies. They call for Reito instead of answering me. Then Reito appears at the window and seizes my leg with his good arm. Together, they start hoisting me back in.

Then, before I even have footing back on the floor, something crashes on the other side the room. We all whip our heads around to watch the zombies start to break through the door. Someone screams. They must've heard all our commotion and gotten riled up. Then everyone starts fumbling around in a panic. I am left to drag myself into the room and hold onto Shi's lifeline myself.

Reito is first to shove us along, "Go! Go! Go!"

Nao breaks out her gun, takes aim, and starts firing. Nao hits the first ones in the face through the hole they've made, but this just encourages them more. There is more ferocious yanking at the door panels then, and she backs up in awe.

We can't just jump the six stories, "Where?!" We're all jumping around, trying to think of options.

They start grabbing frantically at the rest of the line, having remembered our initial plan and build off of that, "Where do we tie it?!" Mai's brother yells over Nao's gunshots.

"Here! Here!" Reito is pushing a hardwood table forward and up next to me with all the adrenaline he has left. Takumi fastens our rope around a leg and casts the rest out the window.

"That won't hold!" I shout. "It needs weight!"

"There's no time!" Nao screams back as dead people break through the lock and the door bursts open. They swiftly pick us out and warily stagger up to us. They groan and there's no stopping them now. Nao takes a final shot at the nearest one and then her clip is out.

Everyone gets up on the table and starts hanging out the window and climbing down the rope.

"Hey!" I shout, still on the floor, holding the heavy line of my loved one for dear life. Mai who is the last one out and also currently halfway out the window, tugs on Shi's line so I have slack enough to wrap it around my hand. Then she is gone and I am by myself.

Quickly jumping up on the table, I crotch down to get a good grip with my left hand on the second rope. A corpse's face leans close to me and my heart leaps into my throat. I nearly fall out of the window, scrambling away as fast as I can. Then the tension of being pulled in two different directions hits me and I'm stuck.

I'm not very far away from the window when the zombies start reaching out the window. They must know that they are still close to getting me, and then they start to stupidly tumble out, carelessly falling the six stories. One abruptly hits me on its way down and knocks me out of my amazing grip.

I am reaching, but I fall. Suddenly I'm in space, and there's somebody above me is crying "oh my god," and I think I screamed in surprise, but the abrupt weightlessness ends just as fast as it started.

Incredibly, I feel my body snatched out of thin air and halted to a stop. My teary face jerks up to see Nao holding me by my shirt, her expression strained by the weight.

"Nao…" I breathe. Too surprised to do anything but let myself dangle there.

"Don't just hang there." She orders, swinging the main line to me. I'm surprised to find that Shizuru's chord is still tied around my hand. And even better yet, she is barely at the ground, and Chie gives me the thumbs up to let go of her. I loosen the knot with my teeth and let the rest of the rope float down.

We climb down but have to jump down at least 3 meters of missing line at the bottom. But we all make it down. I don't dare glance at the bodies of the people that fell.

Chie is there to greet us and is bubbling about Nao's impressive catch, "It was like something out of the movies!" She energetically jumps around us, not having been officially part of the zombie scare in the room. "It was amazing! Good job Nao!" She grins, patting Nao's head, enjoying having entertainment.

Chie even offers to carry Shizuru for me after seeing all of those stunts. I allow it only because my arms are about to fall off. So we continue with Chie piggybacking my beloved and me spotting my unconscious girl so she doesn't fall off.

We push on away from complex, and eventually decide we should continue to head to the shore through much bickering between Nao and I, mostly concerning my need for finding immediate medical treatment for Shizuru and Nao's pessimistic remarks about the lack of any more civilization or hospitals.

We stop our planning there, in trepidation of not knowing what our next move will be. So we walk. We tread carefully around small packs of zombies, but mostly we are unbothered.

We let Reito walk ahead of the rest of us so we can watch him. There was no time to think about it earlier, but why hasn't he changed yet? He was bitten on the shoulder while trying to close the door to the room. Of course, Nao and I only saw the aftermath, but it doesn't make any sense. It's just like Shizuru's bite… But nevertheless, we simply tied up the spot for now and are waiting to see what happens.

I stay next to my new wife as we travel a few more blocks, my thoughts drifting back to us walking and holding hands just one day ago.

We continue to trudge thoughtlessly, generally watching the ground go by. We slump past an unnoticed green bag. And if I had looked at it, I would've noticed the familiar size and shape of the bag. But soon enough, we pass another, and it again goes ignored by us. We drag on.

I hear a muffled growling from somewhere nearby, and my senses, no matter how tired, leap on edge. I look up ahead at an intersection to find a single green bag in the middle of the road. We start looking around, taking in these new buildings, but I keep my focus on this peculiar bag. Curiously, I amble forward towards it ahead of everyone else.

Then I watch in frozen horror as the bag starts to twist and writhe, growling from within. The midday sunlight illuminates the bloody paste smeared on the inside of the lite green plastic. I stand gaping at a zombie squirming inside a gory body bag.

A hand unexpectedly lands on my shoulder from behind me. I snap my feet sideways and send my elbow up into their forearm to knock them off, then take a fighting stance. But it's only Mai, who has caught up to me and whose face is nauseated at the sight in front of us.

I glance down both ends of this street to find it is all lined with these long, green plastic bags. There are no walkers here, these dead must not interest them after all this time. All I can do is just stand still for a minute staring at this scene, taking it all in. Then the smell hits me, floating downwind. Acrid, rancid, rotting flesh pierces through even the thick plastic of the green bio bags. I hunch slightly and pull my shirt over my nose. I can't take it. And we collectively realize where we are. The graveyard.

Rows of people-sized, green biohazard body bags, all with nameless tags, fill the both sides of the street. Gazing to my right, this street flows right down to the river we had been heading away from. That's probably where they were going to dump these bodies. There's even a few dumpsters shoved into the middle of the street, I pause my sightseeing to gag as I notice the limbs hanging out of them. It's a holocaust here. This must have been how the clean up crews started handling the mess when it became too much. It just got too crazy.

I peer at my group of friends, who stumble onto the scene with similar repulsion and shock as well. While skimming through the panorama in distaste, something catches my eye.

There is a toppled sports motorcycle underneath a few piled bodies. Involuntarily, I trod over to it. I ignore the putrid stench for a moment to examine what I can see without touching it. I purse my lips at the Japanese bike. I've always preferred imports.

Mai follows me, wondering what I have planned. I look at her and some kind of cocky grin crosses my face. I leap over the body pile to the sidewalk and move to grab one of the bags. "Here," I grunt, "Help me."

Mai steps back in disgust, also pulling her shirt over her mouth. "Are you crazy? I'm not touch- Natsuki! Don't touch them!" It's too late.

I manage to unearth the unscathed bike and stand it up. I check it over and the outer appearance looks okay. There's no key, so I can't very well start it now. But excitement bubbles in me. I easily could hotwire this kind of bike if I had the right stuff.

"Do you think you could fix it?" Mai abruptly asks me out of my reverie.

I think it over, "Yeah," I say slowly, still examining the nice, blue Suzuki. "I'll need a couple of things though." I nod, finishing my diagnosis. Mai's face sparkles and she suddenly gushes with enthusiasm.

We roll the bike back over to the group at the intersection. I explain that I might be able to get the bike working and the rest of them are thrilled about this. I wish Shizuru were awake to see this good news.

Next, we take something of a lunch break, moving away from all the stinking death to feast on whatever we have in our pockets, mostly mints and the like. We also raid a nearby drug store for whatever we can, ending up with several packets of gum and a couple canned coffees we were lucky enough to find. Then a tub melted ice cream for dessert.

I miss all the things I can't eat. I miss meat, mostly fish. A staple food in the Japanese diet and I haven't had any in months. We haven't been able to eat any meat since the initial breakout. It's all rotten to hell anyway. Vegetables too. And then everything else is missing or eaten up by those who wouldn't even make it. What a waste…

I sit on the sidewalk, with a clear view all around me, holding Shizuru, and I'm suddenly overcome with the concern of her being dehydrated. She hasn't had anything to drink or eat in hours! And she's not even able to help herself or say anything!

"Stop! Stop!" I howl, reaching over the redheaded siblings to get to Nao, who is drinking the last bit of ice cream. I snatch the remaining bit of liquid away from her, pinch Shi's mouth open and pour it in.

"Hey!"

"Natsuki!" My attempt is generally unsuccessful as she is not able to swallow. "Stop it! You're going to choke her!"

"Lay off!" I wave my arm behind me, where Nao has appeared and is trying to grab the container out of my hands.

"Why are you such asshole Natsuki? We're trying to save the living here! Quit wasting it!" Nao bitches.

Unfortunately, her remarks grab my attention. I'm inevitability drawn in, despite all my best efforts to disregard her nasty comments, "What did you say?" Pugnaciously, I stand up straight, as I am finished with failing to quench my poor girl's thirst.

"You heard me!" Nao backs away from me, but her tone remains defiant, "You all know it," She motions to the crowd, who sit frozen, "Fujino's as good as dead already!" Nao's voice slices into my chest.

"Take it back!" I scream, springing up into the mocking redhead and knocking us both to the cement. I immediately form a stranglehold around the younger girl's neck while I have the advantage, but she does the same. We tangle ourselves and I ultimately pin the teenager. We cannot help the frustration as our undernourished mindsets get the better of us.

I hear my name distantly, but the fire in my heart is deafening. Voices grow louder and there are hands and arms interfering, trying in vain to separate us. But it will do now good as long as I am determined.

"Take. It. Back." I snarl powerfully through my teeth. My blackened, dirty, bloody knuckles tighten when she doesn't comply.

"Natsuki." I hear calmly through the fray, spoken in a memorable southern accent. I rip myself off of Nao and turn around. Before I have time to assess where the luminous voice came from, I'm tackled from the side. My cheek skids on pavement.

"Get off me!" I cry, pain singeing my face. Twisting my head up, it's not Nao on top of me. It's Reito.

He utters one word to me, "Stop." Then Nao and I are both swiftly yanked up and we don't talk anymore or make eye contact. The only sound that looms over our groups' silence is moaning. The natural response of dread and terror kicks in at the familiar breathy groans, even in the pure daylight.

I can see the new oncoming group, and it'll only be a matter of minutes, we realize, before this place will be overrun by them. I've once again fucked us over with my noise. The rest of the group glares at Nao and I.

The others fuss over leaving, and I instantly busy myself with attending to Shizuru. Curiously, I wonder if the voice I heard was just a creation of my imagination or not. Timidly, I put two fingers to her wrist to find her pulse. I sigh when I find it, and get ready to pick her up.

I'm forced to leave the new motorcycle behind as its rapidly swallowed by the crowd. Even when I tried to go back and get it, my schoolmates held me back, not allowing my stupidity to be the death of me. And I mutter swears to myself over my bad luck. But I try to make it better by paying attention to the woman who is the world to me. I lovingly scoop her comatose form up and carry her bridal style again. I caught up to my friends and we just try to stay ahead of the pack for a while.

It's dusk by the time we've found a new place. We lost the small following we had when the overpowering smell of the body bag street confused them. It's not very long before we have our hideout secured and we settle into a pile on the floor. We've spent all day trudging through the ruined metropolis, and they don't call it that for nothing. It's taken hours just to get this far and we aren't even at, or probably near, the coast yet. There was a street sign that pointed us in the right direction, but there was a road barricade set up just a few blocks ahead, so we had to shift our path again.

I had briefly begged them to wait around the death zone for the mass to disperse so I could get to the bike. I reminded them how I could easily I could get it working and then we'd have a mode of transportation again! But then someone kills my idea with a 'no gasoline left' comment and we don't go back.

Now we're all numb and achy and we've started chewing on the paper we aren't using for kindling. Generally, we are all crowded around our small fire, except for Reito. All day, we've been expecting the worst from him. But nothing has happened. Once we got his shoulder all bandaged up back in the apartment, he was fine and I don't believe it. I don't understand how it's possible that he is not one of them yet. Of course, my mind then jumps to Shizuru. I don't understand her case either, but she's not one of them yet and I-

A rouge thought suddenly breaches my psyche. The connection between the two of them. What if... the two of them…? I want to shake it off, but I can't. The possibility is too realistic. And it bothers me. It bothers me more than any other current issue. And I have to know.

I scoot uneasily closer to the dark-haired man. I tap my thumbs together childishly. How do I start this?

"How are you feeling?" I inquire quietly.

"Better. " He nods, exhaustion written all over his face.

We pause. Reito vaguely motions to my face, "Sorry about your cheek." He refers to my skinned cheek that was because of his tackle.

"Don't worry about it." I blow it off, waving my hand. I wait a moment before starting this new topic, "Reito, I don't… I don't know why-"

"Why I haven't changed?" He knows exactly what we're all thinking. He doesn't understand either.

"You don't know why?" I clarify. He just shakes his head at this. I'm at a loss for words.

So I jump to the point, "Reito, it's kind of a stupid question, but… did you and Ru… ever… possibly…?"

"Natsuki… I'm sorry, but I don't follow-"

"Have sex?" I demand, a little louder than I was supposed to.

At first he just stares at me. Then, goodheartedly, he laughs. He denies it and I feel like a jerk for doubting Shizuru. I murmur an apology to him then. He says he understands what I'm getting at what with Shizuru's ability to repeal the disease. He dismisses my accusation as sensible and tells me not to worry about that kind of stuff between him and her anymore. He clarifies that he's only ever liked her as a friend, especially now that she's married.

I don't know what other explanation there could be, and he stops to mull over other reasons too. After gazing into the campfire glossy-eyed for a bit, he offers that maybe it was blood. He explains that there has been more than a few times where they had treated each other's open wounds. Maybe whatever Shizuru has was shared with him. He is careful not to assign this as the sure cause after seeing my flare up with the 'official' coma diagnosis from this morning.

But I let the subject go, taking his word on all that he said. I'm too tired to believe otherwise. We can't really go any further into the subject, there's nothing more to discuss. So we quiet.

I begin let my consciousness slip, I don't have to take watch tonight, courtesy of my friends thinking I've had enough for today. My head starts filling with dreams of my old life, when everything was better. I pull my sleeping wife into my arms and for a brief moment just before I nod off, I let myself believe everything will be alright.


End file.
